*Aristotle in his Mechanics says that the mesoneoi (young rowers) sat in the “middle” and had the longest oars. One assumes he uses middle to mean the center line or farthest from the side of the ship.
In the crude drawings below I show how the rowers could have been positioned to satisfy all the historical statements. The rowers sat on benches angled to the back of the ship, with the thranites, zygites, and thalamites seated next to each other. The bench was stepped to allow the rowers to swing their oar without hitting the men sitting next to them.