Attica in the days of Cylon was divided into forty-eight of these naukraries, each of which had to provide a ship[1605]. The business of the naukraroi was however largely financial[1606], so much so that later writers, who may have known them best from references to them in the laws of Solon, seem to have regarded them as exchequer officials[1607], the more so as Cleisthenes replaced the naukraric organization by demes[1608], which had no naval associations. Even the etymological connexion of naukrary with ναῦς (navis, ship) has been called in question. Doubt is first cast on it by Pollux, who wrote his _Onomasticon_ in the second century A.D.[1609]. Modern writers have proposed alternative derivations. Grote derives it from ναίω (I dwell), and explains the naukraroi as the principal householders[1610], a reflex of the suffrage basis of the nineteenth century. Others[1611] connect it with an obscure word ναύω, said by Hesychius and Photius to mean “I beseech,” and connected by Photius with ναός (temple). ναός and ναύω they connect with a dubious gloss of Pollux[1612], which explains ναύκληρος (ship’s captain) by the rare word ἑστιοπάμων (householder, lit. hearthholder), and which they emend by reading ναύκραρος for ναύκληρος. As further Hesychius defines ναύκληρος (_sic_) as the president of a community (συνοικία) they connect the origin of the naukraries with the unification (συνοικισμός) of Attica by Theseus, symbolized by a common hearth[1613]. These philological doubts have been met by G. Meyer[1614], who argues that even assuming that ναός means “hearth,” compounds would require not ναυ- but ναο- or ναυο-. Phonetic analogies all point to a derivation from ναῦς (ship)[1615]. -κραρος is to be connected with κραίνω (make, complete) or perhaps with κραίνω meaning “I rule[1616].” Pollux’s uncertainty about the derivation simply reflects the uncertainty about the history of the naukraries that was prevalent in his days. No naval activities of the naukraroi are recorded by any ancient writer[1617]. But this proves nothing. Naukraries probably had a long history at Athens, like ship-money in England, and in the course of time lost their dominatingly naval character.