According to Aristotle, Cleisthenes wished to ômix upö the population so that more could participate in city affairs (Aristotle 21.2). Cleisthenes reforms included bypassing the usual phratries, or aristocratic landowner associations, by ôcreating a completely new set of political units, the demes. . . based on local descent groups,ö or villages (132). Demes were given direct responsibility for local administration and enrollment of citizens at the age of 18. These demes were grouped into larger units called trittyes, which were in turn grouped by threes into tribes, making 10 tribes in all over the 3 regions of Attica. These tribes selected, by lot,
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