form of royalty altogether. Magistrates called Archons were first
appointed for life from the family of Codrus, and these were
finally exchanged for others appointed for ten years. These and
other successive encroachments on the royal prerogatives resulted
in the establishment of an aristocratic government of the nobility,
and are almost the only events that fill the meager annals of
Athens for several centuries.

The foundation of the Greek colonies in Asia Minor may be said to
form the conclusion of the Mythical Period of Grecian history, and
likewise to furnish the basis for the earlier forms of authentic
Greek literature. Before proceeding, therefore, to the general
events that distinguish the authentic period of Greek history, we
will give, first, a brief sketch of this early literature as
embodied chiefly in the poems of Homer; and, second, will point
out some of the causes that tended to unite the Greeks as a
people, notwithstanding their separation into so many independent
communities or states.




CHAPTER III.

EARLY GREEK LITERATURE, AND GREEK COMMUNITY OF INTERESTS.

The earliest written compositions of the Greeks, of which tradition
or history has preserved any record, were poetical; a circumstance
which, noticed in other nations also, has led to the assertion
that poetry is preeminently the language of Nature. But the first