Phyle is an ancient Greek term for tribe or clan. Members of the same phyle were known as symphyletai meaning 'fellow tribesmen'. During the late 6th century BC, Cleisthenes organized the population of Athens in ten phylai (tribes), each consisting of three trittyes, with each trittys comprising a number of demes. Tribes and demes had their own officers and were self-administered. Some phylai can be classified by their geographic location, such as the Geleontes, the Argadeis, the Hopletes, and the Agikoreis in Ionia, as well as the Hylleans, the Pamphyles, the Dymanes in Doris.

The trittyes, singular trittys were part of the organizational structure that divided the population in ancient Attica, and is commonly thought to have been established by the reforms of Cleisthenes in 508 BC. The name trittys means "third", and is named such because there were three types of regions in each trittys. There were thirty trittyes and ten tribes named after local heroes in Attica. Trittyes were composed of one or more demes; demes were the basic unit of division in Attica, which were the smaller units of population that made up the trittyes..