CHAPTER IV.
The Successors of Theseus .-- The Fate of Codrus .-- The Emigration of Nileus .-- The Archons .-- Draco.
I.

The reputed period of the Trojan war follows close on the age of Hercules and Theseus; and Menestheus, who succeeded the latter hero on the throne of Athens, led his countrymen to the immortal war.
Plutarch and succeeding historians have not failed to notice the expression of Homer, in which he applies the word demus or "people" to the Athenians, as a proof of the popular government established in that state.

But while the line has been considered an interpolation, as late at least as the time of Solon, we may observe that it was never used by Homer in the popular and political sense it afterward received.

And he applies it not only to the state of Athens, but to that of Ithaca, certainly no democracy.

[94] The demagogue king appears to have been a man of much warlike renown and skill, and is mentioned as the first who marshalled an army in rank and file.