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There are ten Receivers elected by lot, one from each tribe; these take over the tablets and wipe off1 the sums paid in the presence of the Council in the Council-chamber, and give the tablets back again to the official clerk; and anybody that has defaulted in a payment is entered on them, and has to pay double the amount of his arrears or go to prison; and the legal authority to impose this fine and imprisonment is the Council. [2] On the first day, therefore, they receive the payments and apportion them among the magistrates, and on the second day they introduce the apportionment, written on a wooden tablet, and recount it in the Council-chamber, and bring forward in the Council any case in which somebody knows of anyone, either an official or a private person, having committed a wrong in relation to the apportionment, and put resolutions to the vote in case anyone is found to have committed any wrong. [3]

The Council also elect by lot ten of their own body as Accountants, to keep the accounts of the officials for each presidency. [4] Also they elect by lot Auditors, one for each tribe, and two Assessors for each Auditor, who are required to sit at the tribal meetings according to the hero after whom each tribe is named,2 and if anyone wishes to prefer a charge, of either a private or a public nature, against any magistrate who has rendered his accounts before the jury-court, within three days from the day on which he rendered his accounts, he writes on a tablet his own name and that of the defendant, and the offence of which he accuses him, adding whatever fine he thinks suitable, and gives it to the Auditor; [5] and the Auditor takes it and reads it, and if he considers the charge proved, he hands it over, if a private case, to those jurymen in the villages who introduced this tribe, and if a public suit, he marks it to the Legislators. And the Legislators, if they receive it, introduce this audit again before the jury-court, and the verdict of the jurymen holds good.

1 See Aristot. Ath. Pol. 47.2 n.

2 i.e. one Auditor and two Assessors are assigned to each tribe, the assignment being indicated by the name of the hero after whom the tribe was named. See Aristot. Ath. Pol. 53.5 n.

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  • Cross-references in notes from this page (2):
    • Aristotle, Constitution of the Athenians, 47.2
    • Aristotle, Constitution of the Athenians, 53.5
  • Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page (1):
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