Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Ephori

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich. 

EPH'ORI (ἔφοροι). Literally, overseers; but the word was especially used as the title of five magistrates elected annually by the people of Sparta, to whom very great political powers were entrusted, which enabled them to exercise a control over the kings and all the other magistrates; and thus, in the Dorian constitutions, the Ephori enjoyed a position somewhat analogous to that of the tribunes at Rome. Aristot. Polit. ii. 10. Cic. Leg. iii. 7.