1910–1911
Britannica 11th
Encyclopaedia Britannica · 11th edition
ARCHON (apxuv, ruler), the title of the highest magistrate in many ancient Greek states. It is only in Athens that we have any detailed knowledge of the office, and even in this one case the evidence presents problems of the first importance which are incapable of decisive solution. There is no doubt that the archons represented the ancient kings, whose absolutism, under conditions which we can only infer, yielded in process of time to the power of the noble families, supported no doubt by the fighting force of the…
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- OCR text aligned to scanned pages
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- Vol. 2, pp. 444-446