Abstract

On the dating of the term of Damasias in the office of eponymous archon in Athens and the first Sacred War in Delphi.Sources suggest two dates for the term of office of Damasias as eponymous archon: 582/1 and 580/79. This paper first aims to prove that both suggestions are correct. Indeed, the name Damasias must have been in the catalogues of archons for the three years during which he held the office, and not just the first. In the second part of the article, a new interpretation is proposed for the chronological subdivisions of the period that marks Solon’s departure and the assumption of the office by Damasias, as known from Chapter XIII of Athenaion Politeia (Constitution of the Athenians), so that these correspond to the two termini defined above. Such an approach obliges us to re‑examine the dating of Solon’s term of office as archon, which forms the point from which calculations are made, an issue that shall be approached through the involvement of the lawgiver in the first Sacred War.