Ramsay, William Mitchell: The cities and bishoprics of Phrygia: being an essay of the local history of Phrygia from the earliest time to the Turkish conquest (Band 1,1): The Lycos Valley and South-Western Phrygia (Oxford, 1895)

no III. HIERAPOLIS: THE HOLY CITY.

to be the civic representative of the supreme power which had once
belonged to the chief-priest of Leto and Lairbenos, wearing the garland
which marked him as holding the place of the god. Just as the old
title (3a<ri\evs often persisted in Greek cities as a municipal office
after the ancient kingly power had fallen into disuse, so apparently
the Stephanephoros continued as an official of many cities after the
old priestly authority had been destroyed. See pp. 56, 103.

§ 13. Gerousia1. The only municipal institution about which we
learn anything from the inscriptions of Hierapolis is the Gerousia.
The Gerousiai of the Asian cities under the Empire were bodies of
great importance ; but their character is rather obscure. It is, on the
one hand, clear that the Gerousia was broadly distinguished in its
nature from the Senate. The Senate was the politically administrative
council of the city : the Gerousia was not a council for administering
the municipal government. On the other hand the Gerousia was
more than a mere club for the older citizens ; it had various powers,
and performed various duties which gave it considerable influence,
and the Senate, the Demos, and the Gerousia often united in the
preamble to honorary decrees2. It is not certain that its character
was the same in all Asian cities; probably it varied a little, though
without any serious difference. The Gerousia and the Neoi are so
often associated together that there must have been a certain cor-
respondence in character and purpose between them. The Neoi, again,
are undoubtedly closely connected with the Epheboi, though neither

1 Opinion among scholars differs to have been a political body: Reinaeh

widely about the character of the holds that the Presbyteroi at Magnesia

Gerousia. Menadier, Hicks, Hogarth, were not the Gerousia, Cousin and Des-

Th. Reinaeh, consider that it was a champs say that they were obviously the

political body, whereas Mommsen and same, BCH 1888 p. 211.
Waddington hold that under the Empire 2 But no stress can be laid on this

it was merely an old men's club for juxtaposition of the three bodies as an

social purposes (the latter view seems argument that all were political in

to me to be nearer the truth, allowing character; for we find occasionally the

for the natural influence in the city Senate, Demos, Gerousia, and Neoi united

acquired by a body containing all the in such honorary decrees (BCH 1885

most experienced and the richest citi- p. 74); and the Neoi were merely the

zens): Reinaeh holds that the Presbyteroi grown men of the city meeting for

and the Gerousia were different bodies, exercise and pleasure as a club in a

Hicks and Menadier that they were the gymnasium. Such an expression as the

same: Reinaeh holds that the Presby- title at Miletos y\ijivaa-iapx']a'"VTa T0S

teroi of Iasos were indubitably a mere yipovaias nai tcov uiav (Ath. Mitih. 1893

social union, Hicks p. yy considers that p. 268) seems a clear proof that the

the powers and duties of the Presbyteroi Gerousia at Miletus was a social club

at Ephesos prove them (i.e. the Gerousia) like the Neoi.