Antiphon and Andocides

Fragment 1. On the Revolution

FRAGMENT 1. ON THE REVOLUTION After the Athenian expedition to Sicily (see the Introduction to Andocides) was defeated by Sparta and its allies in 413, turmoil in Athens led to a coup by a group of four hundred oligarchs. However, this government of the Four Hundred was soon overthrown, its chief proponent, Phrynichus, was assassinated, and almost all the other leading oligarchs went into exile. Antiphon remained in Athens, however , where he and one or two others were tried for treason. The prosecution was an eisangelia (6.12n) before the Council, and the speci fic charge concerned their participation in an embassy to Sparta near the end of the Four Hundred’s brief reign. They were convicted and sentenced to death, confiscation of property, loss of burial rights, and loss of citizen rights for their descendants. The speech Antiphon delivered at this trial was widely admired at the time: one of his readers, Thucydides, called it ‘‘the best defense in a capital case’’ (8.68), and Aristotle reports (Eudemian Ethics 3.5) that the tragedian Agathon praised it, earning Antiphon’s response that the praise of one expert is worth more than that of many ordinary men. Despite this praise, the speech did not survive antiquity, and until the twentieth century it was only known from a few lines and isolated words in later authors.1 In 1907 several pages of a badly mutilated papyrus text from the second or third century ad were discovered and were immediately identified as from this speech. The first excerpt 1 These include Fragments 1b, preserved in Harpocration, and 1c, preserved in the Suda. translated here (1a) is from the best-preserved part of the papyrus; the restoration of other parts is mere guesswork.2 Although we are still in the dark about Antiphon’s overall defense strategy, these fragments convey something of his approach to the situation and the tone of his argument. Fragment 1a begins in the middle of a common argument (cf. 5.57–63) rejecting possible motives for the alleged crime of participation in an oligarchic coup; even though the specific charge concerned an embassy to Sparta, Antiphon seems to have addressed the broader accusation of participation in the coup of the Four Hundred. He then develops a positive argument from likelihood (eikos), that his special profession of logographer would be curtailed under an oligarchy but would thrive under a democracy. Since he could scarcely deny his evident role in the coup, he may have gone on to argue that his goal was not oligarchy but an improved democracy . Fragment 1b responds to the charge that Antiphon’s grandfather was a supporter of the tyrants, and Fragment 1c seems to prepare for a refutation of the prosecution’s expectation that Antiphon will use tears and supplication in his defense. There are some interesting hints at parallels with Socrates’ defense (as presented in Plato’s Apology) a dozen years later. fragment 1 [1a] ^What was supposed to be my motive for conspiring against the democracy? Was it& that I had been selected for a public office where I had handled large sums of money and faced an accounting3 that I feared? Had I been disfranchised? Had I done you some wrong? Did I fear an impending trial? Surely I had no such motive, since I faced none of these situations. Well, were you depriving me of property ? Or ^was it because of & wrongs done by my ancestors? . . . ^Others & desire a different form of government from the one they have fragment 1. on the revolution 91 2 Another part of the papyrus preserves a few legible words, including ‘‘Theramenes , who prosecuted me. . . .’’ Theramenes was originally a member of the Four Hundred but later helped overthrow them; he was also a member of the Thirty in 404 (see Lys. 12.62–78). 3 See 6.43n. because they want to escape punishment for crimes they have committed or take revenge for what they have suffered and not suffer in return. But I had no such motive. My accusers say I used to compose speeches for others to deliver in court and that I profited from this.4 But under an oligarchy I would not be able to do this, whereas under a democracy I have long been the one with power because of my skill with words. I would be worthless in an oligarchy but very valuable in...