dodecarchy

From dodeca- +‎ -archy, after the pattern of heptarchy, etc.

dodecarchy (countable and uncountable, plural dodecarchies)

1. A government of twelve people.
   • 1852, Barthold Georg Niebuhr, Marcus von Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient History, page 105:

     And this dodecarchy may have lasted much longer than is stated by Herodotus; the immense labyrinth on Lake Moeris, the building of which is ascribed to it, is a proof of this, or else we must deny that it was erected during the dodecarchy.

• see Thesaurus:government

• see Thesaurus:government

• dodecarch

• "dodecarchy, n.", in the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press.