Home | Category: Greek Classical Age (500 B.C. to 323 B.C.) / Government and Justice
TYRANTS IN ANCIENT GREECE
Solon bas-relief in the
U.S. House of Representatives chamber The first Greek "tyrants" were not tyrants as we think of them today. They were rulers who ousted local oligarchies with the support of the people. On one level they raised expectations of accountability but on other they were often corrupted by power and evolved in despots, who themselves were overthrown with the support of the people.
“Cylon, a former Olympic champion and a nobleman, led a failed coup in the 7th century B.C. that was detailed in the accounts of ancient historians Herodotus and Thucydides. According to AFP: Cylon sought to rule Athens as a tyrant. But Athenians opposed the coup attempt and he and his supporters were forced to seek refuge in the Acropolis. Cylon managed to escape, but the people who backed him were killed. “The conspirators eventually surrendered after winning guarantees that their lives would be spared. But Megacles, of the powerful Alcmaeonid clan, had the men massacred — an act condemned as sacrilegious by the city authorities. Historians say this dramatic chapter in the story of ancient Athens showed the aristocracy's resistance to the political transformation that would eventually herald in 2,500 years of Athenian democracy. [Source: AFP, April 15, 2016]
Herodotus wrote in “The Histories,” Book V: “Sosicles the Corinthian exclaimed: "Surely the heaven will soon be below, and the earth above, and men will henceforth live in the sea, and fish take their place upon dry land, since you, Lacedaemonians, propose to put down free governments in the cities of Greece, and to set up tyrannies in their stead. There is nothing in the whole world so unjust, nothing so bloody, as a tyranny....If you knew what tyranny was as well as ourselves, you would be better advised than you now are in regard to it. The government at Corinth was once an oligarchy, and this group of men, called the Bacchiadae, held sway in the city, marrying and giving in marriage among themselves....Eventually, Cypselus, the son of Aetion, [one of the Bacchiadae] became master of Corinth. Having thus got the tyranny, he showed himself a harsh ruler — many of the Corinthians he drove into banishment, many he deprived of his fortune, and a still greater number of their lives. His reign lasted thirty years, and was prosperous to its close; insomuch that he left the government to Periander, his son....Where Cypselus had spared any, and had neither put them to death nor banished them, Periander complete what his father had left unfinished. One day he stripped all the women of Corinth stark naked, for the sake of his own wife Melissa.” [Source: Herodotus, “Histories”, translated by George Rawlinson, New York: Dutton & Co., 1862]
Plutarch wrote in “The Life of Solon,'' 29-31: “When Solon was gone, the citizens began to quarrel; Lycurgus headed the Plain; Megacles, the son of Alcmaeon, those to the Seaside; and Pisistratus the Hill-party, in which were the poorest people, the Thetes, and greatest enemies to the rich; insomuch that, though the city still used the new laws, yet all looked for and desired a change of government, hoping severally that the change would be better for them, and put them above the contrary faction. Affairs standing thus, Solon returned, and was reverenced by all, and honored; but his old age would not permit him to be as active, and speak in public, as formerly; yet, by privately conferring with the heads of the factions, he endeavored to compose the differences, Pisistratus appearing the most tractable; for he was extremely smooth and engaging in his language, a great friend to the poor, and moderate in his resentments; and what nature had not given him, he had the skill to imitate; so that he was trusted more than the others, being accounted a prudent and orderly man, one that loved equality...Thus he deceived the majority of people. [Source: Plutarch, “Plutarch’s Lives,”(The "Dryden Plutarch"), (London: J.M. Dent & Sons, Ltd., 1910]
“Now when Pisistratus, having wounded himself, was brought into the market-place in a chariot, and stirred up the people, as if he had been thus treated by his opponents because of his political conduct, a great many were enraged and cried out. After this, the people were eager to protect Pisistratus, and met in an assembly, where one Ariston making a motion that they should allow Pisistratus fifty club-bearers for a guard to his person, Solon opposed it. But observing the poor bent to gratify Pisistratus, and tumultuous, and the rich fearful and getting out of harm's way, he departed...Now, the people, having passed the law, took no notice of the number of his club-bearers, until he seized the Acropolis. When that was done, and the city was in an uproar, Megacles, with all his family, fled.”
See Separate Article: GOVERNMENT IN ANCIENT GREECE europe.factsanddetails.com ; DEMOCRACY IN ANCIENT GREECE europe.factsanddetails.com
Websites on Ancient Greece: Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Greece sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Hellenistic World sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; BBC Ancient Greeks bbc.co.uk/history/; Perseus Project - Tufts University; perseus.tufts.edu ; ; Gutenberg.org gutenberg.org; British Museum ancientgreece.co.uk; Illustrated Greek History, Dr. Janice Siegel, Hampden–Sydney College hsc.edu/drjclassics ; The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization pbs.org/empires/thegreeks ; Cambridge Classics External Gateway to Humanities Resources web.archive.org/web; Ancient Greek Sites on the Web from Medea showgate.com/medea ; Greek History Course from Reed web.archive.org
Draco and His Law Code

Draco image in the US Supreme Court library
Draco produced a code of laws for Athens in which some relatively minor crimes were punished with death. His form of absolutism gave birth to the term "Draconian." Draco was popular however. In 590 B.C., so many well wishers showed up to see him in an Athens stadium he was smothered under a mountain of cloaks and hats thrown in by fans.
Around 632 B.C., Kylon, an aristocrat and former winner at the Olympic games, tried to wrest power from the aristocratic party that ruled Athens and become a sole tyrant in part by fomenting a rebellion of farmers and small land owners, many of whom had lost their land to wealthy landlords due to debts. At that time Athens had no written laws and the poor had no formal way of having injustices addressed. In an attempt to deal with these problems aristocrats asked Draco to create the First Law Code of Athens. This occurred around 620 B.C. and was preserved only by Aristotle in his book The Athenian Constitution. The laws remained in place until they were replaced by Solon’s laws.
Below are some examples from The Athenian Constitution: 1) political rights (in Athens) can only belong to those that carry weapons. These rights are especially for lower rank lords whereas in order for someone to be elected as a general or head of cavalry he should have a fortune of over 100 mnes and have a legitimate Athenian wife and children over 10 years old. [Source: translated by Antonios Loizides, Ancient History Encyclopedia, June 12, 2015]
“2) He who kills another Athenian, without a purpose or by accident should be banished from Athens for ever. If the killer apologizes to the family of the murdered man and the family accepts the apology, then the murderer may stay in Athens.
“3) A relative of a murder victim, can hunt and take into custody the murderer and thus hand him to the authorities where he will be judged. If a relative kills the murderer he will not be allowed to enter the Athenian Forum (agora), or participate in competitions or set foot into sacred places.”
Solon
Solon (638-559 B.C.) is credited with codifying Greek laws and laying the foundation for Athenian democracy. A poet and a statesman, he became the ruler of Athens and replaced a dictatorial form government controlled by the aristocracy with a limited democracy made of wealthy citizens. He passed laws to prevent debtors from being enslaved, helped establish a sort of constitution and made it possible for all citizens to become members of the assembly.
Solon Paul Cartledge of the University of Cambridge wrote in for BBC: “The origin of the Athenian democracy of the fifth and fourth centuries can be traced back to Solon, who flourished in the years around 600 B.C. . Solon was a poet and a wise statesman but not - contrary to later myth - a democrat. He did not believe in people-power as such. But it was Solon's constitutional reform package that laid the basis on which democracy could be pioneered almost 100 years later by a progressive aristocrat called Cleisthenes. [Source: Professor Paul Cartledge, University of Cambridge, BBC, February 17, 2011 |::|]
After an Athenian nobleman named Cylon tried unsuccessfully to seize power in Athens in 632 B.C., Solon, according to Plutarch, was given temporary autocratic powers by Athenian citizens on basis of his “wisdom” to addresse Athens problems in a peaceful and equitable manner. Although the laws that Solon created did last long in the short run, his ideas endured and provided as a basis for Athenian democracy.
Here, Herodotus's “Histories” tells a famous story about the encounter between Solon, the great wise Athenian, and the Lydian King Croesus, regarded as one of the richest men in the world at that time. Herodotus wrote in “Histories” (430 B.C.): “When all these conquests had been added to the Lydian empire, and the prosperity of Sardis was now at its height, there came thither, one after another, all the sages of Greece living at the time, and among them Solon, the Athenian. He was on his travels, having left Athens to be absent ten years, under the pretence of wishing to see the world, but really to avoid being forced to repeal any of the laws which, at the request of the Athenians, he had made for them. Without his sanction the Athenians could not repeal them, as they had bound themselves under a heavy curse to be governed for ten years by the laws which should be imposed on them by Solon. [Source: Herodotus “The History of Herodotus” Book VI on the Persian War, 440 B.C.E, translated by George Rawlinson, MIT]
See Separate Article: SOLON europe.factsanddetails.com
Themistocles

Themistocles
“Themistocles (c. 514-449 B.C.), an Athenian soldier and statesman, was both a major figure during the Persian Wars and major player in Athenian politics at a time when democracy was being crafted there. He was the son of Neocles, an Athenian of no distinction and moderate means, his mother being a Carian or a Thracian Hence according to the Periclean law he would not have been a free Athenian at all. Thucydides properly brings out the fact that, though he lacked that education which was the peculiar glory of the Periclean age, he displayed a marvellous power of analysing a complex situation together with a genius for rapid action. Plutarch similarly enlarges on his consuming ambition for power both personal and national, and the unscrupulous ability with which he pursued his ends. In all these points he is the antithesis of his great rival Aristides. Of his early years little is known. He may have been strategus of his tribe at Marathon and we are told that he deeply envied the glory which Miltiades earned...The death of Miltiades left the stage to Aristides and Themistocles. It is sufficiently clear that their rivalry, terminated in 483-82 by the ostracism of Aristides. [Source: Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition, Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Greece, Fordham University]
“Themistocles was an advocate of a policy of naval expansion. This policy was unquestionably of the highest importance to Athens and indeed to Greece. Athens was faced by the equal if not superior power of Aegina, while the danger of a renewed Persian invasion loomed large on the horizon. Themistocles therefore persuaded his countrymen to put in hand the building of 200 triremes, and — what was of even greater importance-to fortify the three natural harbours of Peiraeus in place of the open roadstead of Phalerum. For the building of the ships Themistocles persuaded the Athenians to allocate 100 talents obtained from the new silver mines at Laurium. One hundred of the proposed 200 were built.
“The year prior to the invasion of Xerxes found Themistocles the chief man in Athens if not in Greece. Though the Greek fleet was nominally under the control of the Spartan Eurybiades, it was Thennistocles who caused the Greeks to fight the indecisive battle of Artemisium, and still more it was he who, by his threat that he would lead the Athenian army to found a new home in the West, and by his treacherous message to Xerxes, precipitated the engagement at Salamis. The retirement of the Persians left the Athenians free to restore their ruined city. Sparta, nominally on the ground that it was dangerous to Greece that there should be any citadel north of the Isthmus which an invader might hold, urged that this should not be done, but Themistocles by means of diplomatic delays and subterfuges enabled the work to be carried sufficiently near to completion to make the walls defensible.
“After the crisis of the Persian invasion Themistocles and Aristides appear to have composed their differences. But Themistocles soon began to lose the confidence of the people, partly owing to his boastfulness (it is said that he built near his own house a sanctuary to Artemis Aristoboule "of good councei") and partly to his alleged readiness to both refer to some accusation leveled against him,1and some time between 476 and 471 B.C. he was ostracized. He retired to Argos, but the Spartans further accused him of treasonable intrigues with Persia, and he fled to Corcyra, thence to Admetus, king of the Molossians, and finally to Asia Minor. He was proclaimed a traitor at Athens and his property was confiscated, though his friends saved him some portion of it. He was well received by the Persians and was allowed to settle in Magnesia on the Maeander.
“Though his end was discreditable, though his great wealth can hardly have been obtained by loyal public service, there is no doubt that his services to Athens and to Greece were great. He created the Athenian fleet and with it the possibiLty of the Delian League (q.v.) which became the Athenian empire, and there are many indications (e.g. his wellattested plan of expansion in the west) that the later imperialist ideal originated in his fertile brain.
See Plutarch (c.46-c.120 CE): Life of Themistocles B.C.), MIT Classics classics.mit.edu; 11th Britannica: Themistocles, Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Greece, Fordham University sourcebooks.web.fordham.edu
Cleisthenes
Cleisthenes Cleisthenes was a radical reformer who renounced tyranny and proclaimed democracy as a new form of government. To reduce the power of the oligarchies he organized the Athenian city-states into ten arbitrary tribes and called 50 representatives from each to tribe to form a boule (Senate) with 500 members.
Paul Cartledge of the University of Cambridge wrote in for BBC: “Cleisthenes was the son of an Athenian, but the grandson and namesake of a foreign Greek tyrant, the ruler of Sicyon in the Peloponnese. For a time he was also the brother-in-law of the Athenian tyrant, Peisistratus, who seized power three times before finally establishing a stable and apparently benevolent dictatorship. It was against the increasingly harsh rule of Peisistratus's eldest son that Cleisthenes championed a radical political reform movement which in 508/7 ushered in the Athenian democratic constitution. [Source: Professor Paul Cartledge, University of Cambridge, BBC, February 17, 2011 |::|]
Pericles
Pericles (490-429 B.C.) ruled over what has been described as the world's first democracy. Although he never claimed the highest title, archon , and described himself simply as one of the ten generals elected each year by the citizenry he was firmly in control during his 27 year rule over Athens and owed his position to his will, charisma and oratory skills. He was the model for the tyrant Creon who condemns Antigone to death and for Oedipus the King.
Pericles instituted for public service, which expanded the realm of democracy, and looked after the welfare of the Athenian poor. But he also made Athens broke by diverted much of the money from the Delian League to finance the construction of Parthenon and other monumental structures.
Pericles was a nobleman with “the bluest blood” and came from one of the wealthiest Athens families. Despite this he was popular with ordinary Athenians and had the rhetorical skills to talk them in doing almost anything. He reportedly had big ears. Images of him show his big ears under a helmet. Pericles was Athens most brilliant statesmen and orator and he seemed know it. He said, "The admiration of the present and succeeding ages will be ours."
See Separate Article: PERICLES: HIS LIFE, SPEECHES AND IMPACT ON ANCIENT ATHENS AND GREECE europe.factsanddetails.com
Aristogeiton and Harmodius, Gay Lovers Who Overthrew the Athenian Tyrrany
During the Peloponnesian War, an group of vandals went around Athens knocking the phalluses off Hermes - the steles with the head and phallus of the God Hermes which were often outside houses. This incident, which lead to suspicions of the Athenian general Alciabiades, provided Thucydides with a spring board to recount the story of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, two homosexual lovers credited by the Athenians with overthrowing tyranny.

Stamnos, Harmodius and Aristogeitom
Thucydides wrote in “The History of the Peloponnesian War,” 6th. Book (ca. 431 B.C.): ““Indeed, the daring action of Aristogiton and Harmodius was undertaken in consequence of a love affair, which I shall relate at some length, to show that the Athenians are not more accurate than the rest of the world in their accounts of their own tyrants and of the facts of their own history. Pisistratus dying at an advanced age in possession of the tyranny, was succeeded by his eldest son, Hippias, and not Hipparchus, as is vulgarly believed. Harmodius was then in the flower of youthful beauty, and Aristogiton, a citizen in the middle rank of life, was his lover and possessed him. Solicited without success by Hipparchus, son of Pisistratus, Harmodius told Aristogiton, and the enraged lover, afraid that the powerful Hipparchus might take Harmodius by force, immediately formed a design, such as his condition in life permitted, for overthrowing the tyranny. In the meantime Hipparchus, after a second solicitation of Harmodius, attended with no better success, unwilling to use violence, arranged to insult him in some covert way. Indeed, generally their government was not grievous to the multitude, or in any way odious in practice; and these tyrants cultivated wisdom and virtue as much as any, and without exacting from the Athenians more than a twentieth of their income, splendidly adorned their city, and carried on their wars, and provided sacrifices for the temples. For the rest, the city was left in full enjoyment of its existing laws, except that care was always taken to have the offices in the hands of some one of the family. Among those of them that held the yearly archonship at Athens was Pisistratus, son of the tyrant Hippias, and named after his grandfather, who dedicated during his term of office the altar to the twelve gods in the market-place, and that of Apollo in the Pythian precinct. The Athenian people afterwards built on to and lengthened the altar in the market-place, and obliterated the inscription; but that in the Pythian precinct can still be seen, though in faded letters, and is to the following effect: “Pisistratus, the son of Hippias,/ Sent up this record of his archonship/ In precinct of Apollo Pythias. [Source: Thucydides, “The History of the Peloponnesian War,” 6th. Book, ca. 431 B.C., translated by Richard Crawley]
“That Hippias was the eldest son and succeeded to the government, is what I positively assert as a fact upon which I have had more exact accounts than others, and may be also ascertained by the following circumstance. He is the only one of the legitimate brothers that appears to have had children; as the altar shows, and the pillar placed in the Athenian Acropolis, commemorating the crime of the tyrants, which mentions no child of Thessalus or of Hipparchus, but five of Hippias, which he had by Myrrhine, daughter of Callias, son of Hyperechides; and naturally the eldest would have married first. Again, his name comes first on the pillar after that of his father; and this too is quite natural, as he was the eldest after him, and the reigning tyrant. Nor can I ever believe that Hippias would have obtained the tyranny so easily, if Hipparchus had been in power when he was killed, and he, Hippias, had had to establish himself upon the same day; but he had no doubt been long accustomed to overawe the citizens, and to be obeyed by his mercenaries, and thus not only conquered, but conquered with ease, without experiencing any of the embarrassment of a younger brother unused to the exercise of authority. It was the sad fate which made Hipparchus famous that got him also the credit with posterity of having been tyrant.
“To return to Harmodius; Hipparchus having been repulsed in his solicitations insulted him as he had resolved, by first inviting a sister of his, a young girl, to come and bear a basket in a certain procession, and then rejecting her, on the plea that she had never been invited at all owing to her unworthiness. If Harmodius was indignant at this, Aristogiton for his sake now became more exasperated than ever; and having arranged everything with those who were to join them in the enterprise, they only waited for the great feast of the Panathenaea, the sole day upon which the citizens forming part of the procession could meet together in arms without suspicion. Aristogiton and Harmodius were to begin, but were to be supported immediately by their accomplices against the bodyguard. The conspirators were not many, for better security, besides which they hoped that those not in the plot would be carried away by the example of a few daring spirits, and use the arms in their hands to recover their liberty.

the image on the vase above
“At last the festival arrived; and Hippias with his bodyguard was outside the city in the Ceramicus, arranging how the different parts of the procession were to proceed. Harmodius and Aristogiton had already their daggers and were getting ready to act, when seeing one of their accomplices talking familiarly with Hippias, who was easy of access to every one, they took fright, and concluded that they were discovered and on the point of being taken; and eager if possible to be revenged first upon the man who had wronged them and for whom they had undertaken all this risk, they rushed, as they were, within the gates, and meeting with Hipparchus by the Leocorium recklessly fell upon him at once, infuriated, Aristogiton by love, and Harmodius by insult, and smote him and slew him. Aristogiton escaped the guards at the moment, through the crowd running up, but was afterwards taken and dispatched in no merciful way: Harmodius was killed on the spot.
“When the news was brought to Hippias in the Ceramicus, he at once proceeded not to the scene of action, but to the armed men in the procession, before they, being some distance away, knew anything of the matter, and composing his features for the occasion, so as not to betray himself, pointed to a certain spot, and bade them repair thither without their arms. They withdrew accordingly, fancying he had something to say; upon which he told the mercenaries to remove the arms, and there and then picked out the men he thought guilty and all found with daggers, the shield and spear being the usual weapons for a procession.
“In this way offended love first led Harmodius and Aristogiton to conspire, and the alarm of the moment to commit the rash action recounted. After this the tyranny pressed harder on the Athenians, and Hippias, now grown more fearful, put to death many of the citizens, and at the same time began to turn his eyes abroad for a refuge in case of revolution. Thus, although an Athenian, he gave his daughter, Archedice, to a Lampsacene, Aeantides, son of the tyrant of Lampsacus, seeing that they had great influence with Darius. And there is her tomb in Lampsacus with this inscription: “Archedice lies buried in this earth,/ Hippias her sire, and Athens gave her birth; / Unto her bosom pride was never known.” Though daughter, wife, and sister to the throne. Hippias, after reigning three years longer over the Athenians, was deposed in the fourth by the Lacedaemonians (Spartans) and the banished Alcmaeonidae, and went with a safe conduct to Sigeum, and to Aeantides at Lampsacus, and from thence to King Darius; from whose court he set out twenty years after, in his old age, and came with the Medes to Marathon.”
Demosthenes
Demosthenes Demosthenes (383-322 B.C.) is considered the greatest orator of the Golden Age of Greece although he actually arose after the Golden Age was over. Born into a wealthy family but orphaned at the age of seven, he had a misshapen shoulder and was cheated out of his family wealth by his guardians.
At a young age, Demosthenes began a concerted effort to improve his oratory skills. He used to fill his mouth with pebbles to improve his delivery and give speeches over pounding surf to train his voice to rise above the din of crowds. He entered public office in Athens at 25 and was involved in the negotiations that kept Alexander the Great's father from conquering Athens. In his famous speech, On the Crown he spoke eloquently about the relationship between government and the people.
Demosthenes was a Greek statesman and orator of ancient Athens. His orations constitute a significant expression of contemporary Athenian intellectual prowess and provide an insight into the politics and culture of ancient Greece during the 4th century BC. Demosthenes learned rhetoric by studying the speeches of previous great orators. He delivered his first judicial speeches at the age of 20, in which he argued effectively to gain from his guardians what was left of his inheritance. For a time, Demosthenes made his living as a professional speech-writer (logographer) and a lawyer, writing speeches for use in private legal suits. [Source: Wikipedia +]
Demosthenes grew interested in politics during his time as a logographer, and in 354 BC he gave his first public political speeches. He went on to devote his most productive years to opposing Macedon's expansion. He idealized his city and strove throughout his life to restore Athens' supremacy and motivate his compatriots against Philip II of Macedon. He sought to preserve his city's freedom and to establish an alliance against Macedon, in an unsuccessful attempt to impede Philip's plans to expand his influence southward by conquering all the other Greek states. +
Some of Demosthenes decisions were unpopular. After an attempt to oust the Macedonians after Alexander the Great's death failed he was chased into a Poseidon temple. According to legend, when he was caught, he asked if he could write one last letter and then bit into his pen, which was filled with poison, and died. Before he passed on he said, “If I had foreseen the evils, anxieties, envious persecutions, slanders and feuding of political life, I would rather have taken the short cut to death."
Hyperides and the Archimedes Palimpsest
Hyperides was one of the great foundational figures of Greek democracy and the golden age of Athenian democracy. He lived from 390 or 389 B.C. until 322 B.C. and was an orator who made speeches at public meetings of the citizen assembly. A contemporary of Aristotle and Demosthenes, he wrote speeches for himself and for others and spoke at important political trials. In 322 B.C. Hyperides was executed by the Macedonians for participating in a failed rebellion. [Source: Felicia R. Lee, New York Times, November 27, 2006]
New insights about Hyderides and the period in which he lived have been gleaned Archimedes Palimpsest, a prayer book created by Byzantine monks in the 13th century and from pages of several older texts that were washed and scraped, to remove their writing. Felicia R. Lee wrote in the New York Times, “The Archimedes Palimpsest is best known for containing some of the oldest copies of work by the great Greek mathematician who gives the manuscript its name. But there is more to the palimpsest than Archimedes’ work, including 10 pages of Hyperides, offering tantalizing and fresh insights into the critical battle of Salamis in 480 B.C., in which the Greeks defeated the Persians, and the battle of Chaeronea in 338 B.C., which spelled the beginning of the end of Greek democracy." The Archimedes Palimpsest was sold at auction at Christie's for $2.2 million in 1998.
The new Hyperides revelations include two previously unknown speeches, effectively increasing this renowned orator's body of work by 20 percent, said Judson Herrman, a 36-year-old professor of classics at Allegheny College in Meadville, Pa. He is one of a handful of classicists who have written doctoral dissertations on Hyperides. “This helps to fill in critical moments in ancient classical Greece," said William Noel, the curator of manuscripts and rare books at the Walters Art Museum here and the director of the Archimedes Palimpsest project.
“It's a spotlight shining on an important moment in history," said Mr. Herrman, currently a fellow at the National Humanities Center in Research Triangle Park, N.C. Until the new leaves were found in the palimpsest, most scholars believed only fragments of Hyperides survived beyond the Classical period. The mystery of Archimedes’ treatise on combinatorics, the Stomachion, was solved in 2003 by deciphering the palimpsest. Now W. Robert Connor, the president of the Teagle Foundation, which provides education and financial resources for education, called the discovery of new Hyperides text a “tour de force of the first order."

Hyperides
A combination of high-tech imagery and old-fashioned deciphering, sometimes letter by letter, was used to resurrect the older text, revealing a slice of Athenian history in the days after its devastating defeat by Philip II, king of Macedonia and the father of Alexander the Great, Mr. Connor said. “The number of times you get a new text is very small," Mr. Connor, a former professor of classics at Princeton said. “It's like hearing an old violin played at a superb level."
In one recently discovered speech, Hyperides talks about the number of boats (220) — a number not previously clear — belonging to the Greek side in the Salamis battle, Mr. Judson said. In another speech, after the Battle of Chaeronea, he argues that the tragic defeat was the result of chance, not bad policy. In a political case Hyperides supports the Demosthenes policy that led to the Athenian defeat.
“For we chose the noblest policy and we believed it necessary to free the Greeks by taking on the risks ourselves, just like before," Hyperides argues in a passage translated by Mr. Herrman and transcribed by Natalie Tchernetska of Riga, Latvia, a project scholar and specialist in Greek palimpsests, whom Mr. Herrman credits with first identifying the material. “One must assign the start and the suggestion of every risk to those who make the motion, but the outcome of these things is to be assigned to chance," Hyperides argues in the speech. “Diondas proposes the opposite happen: not that Demosthenes be praised for his policy but that I give a defense because of chance."
Professor Herrman said the material also gives new information about inheritance laws in Athens and suggests a different timing for the Demosthenes case. Historians had always believed that the trial of Demosthenes took place before the battle of Chaeronea, which Athens lost to the Macedonians, but the newly discovered speech shows that it was after the battle, Mr. Herrman said. “We had no idea of what the content of the trial was," he said. “Now we have an Athenian view of their own defeat."
Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons
Text Sources: Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Greece sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Hellenistic World sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; BBC Ancient Greeks bbc.co.uk/history/; Canadian Museum of History, Perseus Project - Tufts University; perseus.tufts.edu ; MIT Classics Online classics.mit.edu ; Gutenberg.org, Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, New York Times, Washington Post, Live Science, Discover magazine, Natural History magazine, Archaeology magazine, The New Yorker, Encyclopædia Britannica, "The Discoverers" and "The Creators" by Daniel Boorstin. "Greek and Roman Life" by Ian Jenkins from the British Museum, Wikipedia, Reuters, Associated Press, The Guardian, AFP and various books and other publications.
Last updated September 2024