The King in the first place superintends the mysteries, in conjunction
with the Superintendents of Mysteries. The latter are elected in the
Assembly by open vote, two from the general body of Athenians, one from
the Eumolpidae, and one from the Ceryces. Next, he superintends the
Lenaean Dionysia, which consists of a procession and a contest. The
procession is ordered by the King and the Superintendents in
conjunction; but the contest is managed by the King alone. He also
manages all the contests of the torch-race; and to speak broadly, he
administers all the ancestral sacrifices. Indictments for impiety come
before him, or any disputes between parties concerning priestly rites;
and he also determines all controversies concerning sacred rites for
the ancient families and the priests. All actions for homicide come
before him, and it is he that makes the proclamation requiring polluted
persons to keep away from sacred ceremonies. Actions for homicide and
wounding are heard, if the homicide or wounding be willful, in the
Areopagus; so also in cases of killing by poison, and of arson. These
are the only cases heard by that Council. Cases of unintentional
homicide, or of intent to kill, or of killing a slave or a resident
alien or a foreigner, are heard by the court of Palladium. When the
homicide is acknowledged, but legal justification is pleaded, as when a
man takes an adulterer in the act, or kills another by mistake in
battle, or in an athletic contest, the prisoner is tried in the court
of Delphinium. If a man who is in banishment for a homicide which
admits of reconciliation incurs a further charge of killing or
wounding, he is tried in Phreatto, and he makes his defence from a boat
moored near the shore. All these cases, except those which are heard in
the Areopagus, are tried by the Ephetae on whom the lot falls. The King
introduces them, and the hearing is held within sacred precincts and in
the open air. Whenever the King hears a case he takes off his crown.
The person who is charged with homicide is at all other times excluded
from the temples, nor is it even lawful for him to enter the
market-place; but on the occasion of his trial he enters the temple and
makes his defence. If the actual offender is unknown, the writ runs
against 'the doer of the deed'. The King and the tribe-kings also hear
the cases in which the guilt rests on inanimate objects and the lower
animal.