I have just finished dreading Lives of the Noble Greeks by Plutarch. (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plutarch/) This was half of his work Lives Of The Noble Greeks and Romans. I take from this great classic work the following:

In this series, Plutarch sought parallels between the great figures of Ancient Greece and Rome-Theseus, the legendary founder of Athens, to Romulus, the founder of Rome; Alexander to Caesar; and Demosthenes to Cicero. Plutarch sifts through the varying accounts he finds about these great figures, researching them, and deciding which ones are the most credible.

In the biographies of the great lawgivers-Solon of Athens, Lycurgus of Sparta-they dealt with the problem of social inequality: a small wealthy elite at the top, and a vast poor underclass at the bottom, and the dangers this posses to a nation-something we still have to deal with in this era.