[Illustration: CAST OF A RELIEF IN ATHENS. Showing the disposition of rowers in a trireme.] The most general idea, then, is that the trireme was fitted with three tiers of oarsmen. In this case the _thalamitai_ were those who sat and worked on the lowest tier; the _zugitai_, those who sat on the beams; whilst the _thranitai_ were the men who sat on the highest tier. (Homer refers to the seven-foot bench, or _thrēnus_, which was the seat of the helmsman or the rowers). Each oarsman, it is thought, sat below and slightly to the rear of the oarsman above him, so that these three sections of men formed an oblique line. This economised space and facilitated their movements. A variation of this same theory suggests that the _thalamitai_ sat close to the vessel’s side, the _zugitai_ who were higher up being distant from the side the breadth of one thwart, whilst the _thranitai_, higher still, were the breadth of two thwarts away. The oar of each rower would pass over the head of the rower below. But a better theory of the arrangement of the trireme may be presented as follows, and it has the advantage of satisfying all the evidence found in ancient literature and pictorial representation. Banish, then, from your mind all thought of three superimposed tiers, and instead consider a galley so arranged that the rowers work side by side. Each of the triple set of oarsmen sits pulling his own separate oar. But all three oars emerge through one porthole. In front of each bench was a stretcher, and the rower stood up grasping his oar and pulled back, letting the full weight of his body fall on to the stroke till at its end he found himself sitting on the bench. On either side of him, at the same bench, was another rower doing the same exertion. In each porthole there would thus be three thole-pins to fit three oars. In this case, then, the _thalamitēs_ would be he who rowed nearest the porthole. Because he worked the shortest oar and thus had the least exertion he received the least pay. Next to him sat the _zugitēs_, and next to the latter came the _thranitēs_, who worked the longest oar, and therefore did the most work, having to stand on a stool (_thranos_) in order to get greater exertion on to his oar at the beginning of the stroke. It is supposed that the rowers’ benches were not all in the same plane, but that the second would be higher than the first, and the third higher than the second.