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On the Date of Antiphon's Fifth Oration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

P. S Breuning
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Antiphon's speech on the murder of Herodes has been variously dated by several scholars, but all seem to agree that it was delivered a good many years after the revolt and recapture of Mytilene. According to this opinion the speaker in § 74 declares himself too young to know much of what happened in those days. Before going into this more carefully, it seems necessary to visualize the situation of the accused man. In order to achieve this the best we can do is to follow his own words in the Sirjyrjcris, §§ 20–24: ‘I travelled from Mytilene on the same ship as the lost man; we were on our journey to Ainos, I to see my father—he happened to be there at that time—he in order to sell some slaves to Thracian natives. These natives, who were to pay the ransom, and the slaves were on board too.—All this I will prove by witnesses.—As we, however, met with stormy weather, we were compelled to put in to a harbour in the territory of Methymna; there we found that* ship into which Herodes changed; in that ship, according to the accusers, he died. Now all this was mere chance: obviously I had not persuaded him to travel with me, no, he was travelling on his own business. Then I, personally, had a very good reason for travelling to Ainos; our putting in to that harbour was not premeditatd, we were compelled to. And again, when we were lying at anchor, the change of ship took place without any trickery or fraud: again, it was done because of necessity. The ship, viz., on which we had been travelling was not covered, the other one on the contrary had a covering; that was because of the rain.—All this I will prove by witnesses.—After boarding the other ship we drank some wine. After that it is only known that he left the ship, but did not return. I myself never left the ship that night at all. When the next day but did not return. I myself never left the ship that night at all. When the next day he had disappeared, we looked for him, I as well as the others. Probably it seemed strange to them, it certainly did to me. And it was I who caused a messenger to be sent to Mytilene, not one of the crew or the passengers belonging to Herodes, but my own servant. If I had been guilty, I would not, of course, have sent a man who might have informed against me. But when the man could not be found in Mytilene, nor anywhere else, and when the weather had improved and all the other ships were putting out, I also sailed.—All this I will prove by witnesses.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 31 , Issue 2 , April 1937 , pp. 67 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1937

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References

paege 67 note 1 το πλοῖον το⋯ϒο seems a little surprising, as it is not mentioned earlier. We must not, how- ever, forget that the judges had heard about it at the άν⋯κρισις.

paege 67 note 2 Another point in his favour is that he went to Athens voluntarily to defend himself. If he had committed murder, he would, to my mind, not have risked so great a danger. On the other hand he must have thought his opponents' posi tion weak, as they wavered in their assertions as to how the murder actually happened, § 29.

page 68 note 1 On the word χωροφιλεῖν see Donum Natalicium Schrijnen 1929 pp. 656 ff.

page 68 note 2 τέλη καϒαϒἰθηοιν, he pays the rent on the land, which had been confiscated by the Athenians after the suppression of the revolt, cf. Boeckh, Staatstumshaltung I3 p. 586Google Scholar.

page 68 note 3 The cleruchs probably were the soldiers who had suppressed the rebellion, see Ed. Meyer, , Geschichte des Altertums IV p. 347Google Scholar: ‘Die Ansiedler blieben jedoch in den Städten als Garnison concentrirt.’

page 68 note 4 Its name appears in several tribute lists, see Index of I.G.I2

page 68 note 5 CfHerod. VII 58 and Strabo frg. 52 p. 331 (Kramer II p. 88).

page 68 note 6 Probably Herodes was drowned by accident under the influence of too much wine, § 26 μεθύ οντος το⋯ άνδρ⋯ς.

page 68 note 7 Cf. Aristot.' A. II. 3. 6 ή ϒάρ αἲρεσις τ⋯ν άρχ⋯νων άριστίνδην κα⋯ πλουτίνδην ἦν έξ ὦν οἱ' Αρεοπϒῖταν καθίσταντο and Philoch.frg. 58 FHG (quoted by Sandys ad l.) οὐ παντ⋯ς άνδρος ἦν είς τήν έξ ' Αρείου πάϒου βουλήν τελεῖν άλλ οί παρ' ΑθηναίΟις πρω τεύοντες ἓν τΕ ϒένει κα⋯ πλούτΨ κα⋯ βίΨ χρηστῷ.

page 68 note 8 Cf. §10 ἓπειτα τίμησίν μοι έποίησαν.

page 68 note 9 Cf. Neil, ad Aristoph. Equ. 347Google Scholar (metics) and 839/40, and Aristoph. Pac. 639/40 (Maetzner, ad Antiph. VI 43)Google Scholar:

τ⋯ν δέ σομμάχων ἔσειον τούς παχεῖς καі πλουσіους

αіϒіας ἂν π ροστιθέντες, ώς Φρονεῖ τά Βρασіδου.

page 68 note 10 Compare the much more outspoken challenge of the defendant in VI 43, who is an Athenian himself.

page 69 note 1 The uncertainty of the text referred to above does not affect the argument. On the other hand the interpretation here given seems to support Reiske's, not Blass's, insertion of τούς δέ, see Thalheim's app. crit.

page 69 note 2 Stallbaum, Maetzner quotes, ad Plat. Charm. 157e (158a)Google Scholar. See also Herod. I 96, 148, 171; Xen, . Hell. Ill 1. 5Google Scholar.

page 69 note 3 Cp. Ed. Meyer, IV p. 555, and see also note 5 on this page. heading.

page 69 note 4 Hostilities, of course, even after peace had been formally concluded, never quite ceased, but their scene was the mainland of Greece, not the Aegaean or the coast of Asia Minor.

page 69 note 5 Moreover from § 81, άσΦαλ⋯ς διαπράσσεθε, it has already been deduced that the oration must be anterior to the expedition to Sicily.

page 69 note 6 IV 52.3 these are called Ακταῖαι πόλεις, cf. I. G. I2 64. 91. where Antandros, Rhoiteion and other towns are mentioned under the same heading.

page 70 note 1 In the same way the description of the weather in the oration §§ 21 (storm) and 22 (rain) seems to imply that the journey took place in the early spring.

page 70 note 2 If we assume this date as being correct, the words in § 81 άσΦ⋯ς &διαπράσσεσθε are indeed in agreement with the circumstances, as owing to the capture of the Spartan soldiers on Sphacteria no Peloponnesian troops were on Attic territory and the battle of Delion did not take place till later in the year (November according to Ed. Meyer, IV p. 395).

page 70 note 3 He did not want to remind his judges of the cruel way the revolt had been quelled, and even less of the much worse cruelty which had been prevented in the nick of time, cp. the beginning of § 77.