Phalaris of Agrigentum, a tax collector, when the citizens wished to erect a temple of Zeus Polieus for two hundred talents on the citadel as being rocky and strong and for the further reason that it would be pious to give the god the highest place, undertook, if he was given charge of the work, to have the best craftsmen and provide the material cheaply and offer sound securities for the money. The people trusted him, thinking that thanks to his life as a tax-collector he had experience of such proceedings. So taking the public money he hired many foreigners and bought many prisoners and carried up to the citadel much material of stone, timber, iron. And when the foundations were already being dug, he sent down his herald to proclaim “whoever gives information against those who stole the stone and iron on the citadel shall receive such and such a reward.” The people were annoyed at the report of the material being stolen. “Well then,” said he, “allow me to enclose the acropolis.” The city allowed him to enclose it and to raise a wall round it. He released the prisoners, armed them with the stones and hatchets and axes, made an attack during the Thesmophoria, killed most of the men, and having established himself as master of women and children, became the tyrant of the city of Agrigentum[1394]. For over two centuries the name of Phalaris has been chiefly associated with the famous controversy between the Cambridge Bentley and the Oxford Boyle as to the authenticity of the letters ascribed to him. The spuriousness of these letters was so convincingly established by the Cambridge scholar, that everyone since then seems to have shrunk from attributing historical value to anything whatsoever that Phalaris is reported to have done. It so happens that the best known tradition about Phalaris tells of his extreme cruelty[1395], and more particularly how he did his victims to death by roasting them alive in a brazen bull[1396]. This bull story has no doubt helped further to discredit Phalaris as a strictly historical character. Yet there can be no dispute that Phalaris did make himself tyrant of Agrigentum and that his cruelty made a lasting impression on the people whom he ruled. His existence and importance is shown by a whole series of references to him that begins with Pindar[1397] and includes allusions in Aristotle[1398]. Considering that the tyrant probably died only one generation before Pindar was born[1399], there is no reason why a trustworthy tradition about him should not have been preserved and more particularly why the account of his early days in Polyaenus should not have a historical basis. If it has, its significance is important. It means that Phalaris owed his tyranny in the ultimate instance to his skill in finance and more immediately to the control of large sums of money that gave him great influence over the lower classes who earned their living by manual labour[1400].