2. There was at ARGOS a class of bond-slaves, who are compared with the Helots, and were called _Gymnesii_.(213) The name alone sufficiently proves the correctness of the comparison; these slaves having evidently been the light-armed attendants on their masters (γύμνητες). Hence also the same class of slaves were in Sicyon called κορυνηφύροι; because they only carried a club or staff, and not, like the heavy-armed Dorians, a sword and lance. It is to these Gymnesii that the account of Herodotus refers,(214) that 6000 of the citizens of Argos having been slain in battle by Cleomenes king of Sparta,(215) the slaves got the government into their own hands, and retained possession of it until the sons of those who had fallen were grown to manhood. From this narrative it is plain that the number of Dorians at Argos was nearly exhausted by the death of 6000 of their body; and that none but bondsmen dwelt in the immediate neighbourhood of the city, since otherwise the sovereign power would not have fallen into their hands. It would be absurd to suppose that slaves bought in foreign countries can be here intended, since these could have had no more notion of governing a Grecian state than the bear in the fable of managing the ship.(216) Afterwards, when the young citizens had grown up, the slaves were compelled by them to withdraw to Tiryns; and then, after a long war, as it appears, were either driven from the territory, or again subdued.(217) The Argives, however, also had Periœci,(218) who were known by the name of _Orneatæ_. This appellation was properly applied to the inhabitants of Orneæ, a town on the frontiers towards Mantinea, which, having been long independent, was at last, about the year 580 B.C.,(219) reduced by the Argives; and afterwards the whole class of Periœci was so called from that place. These Orneatæ, or Periœci, therefore, like those of Laconia, formed separate communities of their own, which indeed was the case so late as the Persian war. For (as we have shown above) the Argives about this time incorporated the surrounding towns belonging to the Periœci,(220) for the purpose of replenishing and increasing their own numbers, and gave them the rights of citizens. With this period an entirely new era in the history of the constitution of Argos commences, although this state of things has from its greater notoriety often been improperly applied also to earlier times. Thus Isocrates(221) says that the Dorians of Argos, like those of Messene, admitted the native inhabitants into the city (as σύνοικοι), and gave them equal rights of citizenship, with the exception of offices of honour; contrasting with it the conduct of the Spartans, in a manner which every one now perceives to have been entirely groundless. The change in the constitution of Argos then introduced was no less than if the whole body of Periœci in Laconia had declared themselves the sovereign community. For the newly-adopted citizens appear to have soon