AMPHICTYONS, Amphictyones, in Antiquity, the Deputies of the Cities and People of Greece, who represented their respective Nations in a general Assembly; having a full Power to concert, resolve, and appoint what they should think fit, for the Service of the common Cause. The Amphictyons, in good measure, were the same with the States General of Holland; or rather, with what in Germany they call the Diet of the Empire. See STATES, and DIET. The first Assembly of this kind, was held by the Direction of Amphictyon, the third King of Athens, who proposed by that means to bind the Greeks more firmly together; so as to render them a Terror to the barbarous Nations their Neighbours. These met twice a year at Thermopylae, in the Temple of Ceres, which was built in a large Plain, near the River Asopus; and were called Amphictyones from the Name of their Founder. Pausanias, in his List of the ten Nations which composed that Assembly, says nothing of the Achaeans, Eleus, Argians, Messenians, &c. Aeschines also gives an Account of the Cities admitted into it, in his Oration, De falsa Legatione. Acrisius instituted a new Council of Amphictyones, on the Model of the ancient ones; who met twice a Year in the Temple of Delphos. Each were indifferently called Amphictyones, Thalassogens, Hesperiogens, and their Assembly Panhellenion. The Romans never thought fit to suppress the Meeting of the Amphictyons. Strabo even assures us, that they met in his Time.
