Greek military hierarchy was analogous to that of the Romans, and generally of the civilised world of antiquity. The basic unit of the phalanx was the 'lochoi' or 'lochos' - a line of armoured, armed hoplites. Roughly ten lines deep, they moved as a tight group in combat. In the Athenian army, the lochos was governed by a captain known as the 'lochagos', and several lochoi formed a regiment or 'taxeis', in turn led by another commander, the 'taxiarchos'. The Spartans, being a much more militarised society, were initially divided into 'phratra' (fraternities) before also adopting lochoi, which were drawn from their villages. The Spartan army was led by both Spartan kings, but after the 6th century BC one remained in Sparta whilst the other went to war. They were free to battle partly because of Sparta's militaristic nature, but also because true Spartan power lay not with them, but with its elected council.
