5. More obscure even than the condition of the cosmi and prytanes are the origin and powers of the ARTYNÆ at Argos.(611) They cannot have arisen at a late period, for example, after the abolition of the royalty, since the same office existed in their ancient colony, Epidaurus, whose constitution resembled that of Argos only in the more ancient period. Since it did not originate from the downfall of the royalty, its origin may, perhaps, have been owing to a division of the regal authority, perhaps of the civil and military functions. In Epidaurus the artynæ were presidents of a large council of one hundred and eighty members:(612) in Argos they are mentioned in connexion with a body of eighty persons, and a (democratic) senate, of whose respective powers we are entirely ignorant.(613) The present is a convenient occasion for mentioning the DEMIURGI, as several grammarians state that they were in particular a Doric magistracy,(614) perhaps, however, only judging from the form δαμιουργός. These magistrates were, it is true, not uncommon in Peloponnesus,(615) but they do not occur often in the Doric states. They existed among the Eleans and Mantineans,(616) the Hermioneans,(617) in the Achæan league,(618) at Argos also,(619) as well as in Thessaly;(620) officers named _epidemiurgi_ were sent by the Corinthians to manage the government of their colony Potidæa.(621) The statements and interpretations of the grammarians afford little instruction: among the Achæans at least, their chief duty was to transact business with the people; which renders it probable, that at Argos they were identical with the _leaders of the people_;(622) of whom, as well as of some other public officers, whose functions admit of further explanation, we will speak in the following chapter. Chapter IX. § 1. Constitutions of Argos. § 2. Epidaurus, Ægina, Cos. § 3. Rhodes. § 4. Corinth. § 5. Corcyra. § 6. Ambracia, Leucadia, Epidamnus, Apollonia. § 7. Syracuse. § 8. Gela, Agrigentum. § 9. Sicyon, Phlius. § 10. Megara. § 11. Byzantium, Chalcedon, Heraclea Pontica. § 12. Cnidos, Melos, Thera. § 13. Cyrene. § 14. Tarentum. § 15. Heraclea Sciritis. § 16. Croton. § 17. And Delphi. § 18. Aristocratic character of the constitution of Sparta. 1. It is my intention in the present chapter to collect and arrange the various accounts respecting the alterations in the constitution of those Doric states, which deviated more from their original condition than Crete and Sparta: having been more affected by the general revolutions of the Greek governments, and drawn with greater violence into the strong current of political change.