AXŎNES

( ἄξονες ), also called kurbeis ( κύρβεις ), wooden tablets of a square or pyramidal form, made to turn on an axis, on which were written the laws of Solon. According to some writers the Axones contained the civil, and the Kurbeis the religious laws; according to others the Kurbeis had four sides and the Axones three. But at Athens, at all events, they seem to have been identical. They were at first preserved in the Acropolis, but were afterwards placed in the agora, in order that all persons might be able to read them. b BĀLISTA, BALLISTA. [ Tormentum . ]