The Spartan senate as reconstructed by Lycurgus was composed of thirty members including the two kings or military leaders.[183] These chiefs were the heads of the several gentes. The Ecclesia, or assembly of the people, “contained originally all the free males who dwelt within the city were of a legal age.”[184] Hence may be observed the fact that the constitution of the state was the same as that in the Upper Status of barbarism; yet the spectacle of a double monarchy (notwithstanding the fact that it has been designated as a kind of irresponsible generalship)[185] shows that the power attached to the office of _basileus_ had become a menace to the liberties of the people; hence this equal division of responsibility and authority. [183] Grote, _History of Greece_, vol. ii., p. 345. [184] Rawlinson, book v., essay i. [185] Aristotle, _Politics_, book iii., Jowett’s translation. The Spartan men were warriors who had subjugated the country, making serfs of the original inhabitants. In the time of Lycurgus these gentlemen soldiers constituted an aristocratic class who spent their lives in the performance of public duties, leaving the cultivation of the soil to the serfs. Helots, the name given to the serfs, signifies “captives.” They were the slave population of Laconia.[186] The manufacturers and tradespeople of the towns and country districts around Sparta were free, but had been deprived of their political rights. It is evident from these facts that although the constitution of the state had not been changed, the division of the people into classes, a division which since the latter part of the Second Status of barbarism had been threatened, had through spoliation and conquest already taken place. Add to this the fact that property had passed into the hands of private individuals, and we shall observe that the conditions had already become favourable for the development of that thirst for wealth and power which characterizes monarchial institutions. [186] Rawlinson, book v., essay i. If we carefully note the early condition of Spartan society, and studiously observe the processes involved in the growth of human institutions, we shall be enabled to perceive the nature of the “load” under which the Spartans “groaned” in the time of Lycurgus. The fact has been noted that, throughout an entire ethnical period, human ingenuity had been taxed to the utmost to subdue or keep in check the growing tendency toward usurpation and tyranny, and the spectacle of a double monarchy, or of two military chieftains as they appeared in ancient Sparta, indicates an attempt on the part of the people to divide the power which had become attached to this office, and which was doubtless already menacing the popular rights.