BMCR 2008.07.49

Demosthenes: Speeches 60 and 61, Prologues, Letters. The Oratory of Classical Greece, Volume 10

, , Speeches 60 and 61, Prologues, Letters. Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002.. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2006. 1 online resource (xxxv, 142 pages).. ISBN 9780292795761. $19.95 (pb).

Table of Contents

“The Oratory of Classical Greece” (OCG) series continues its steady march towards fulfilling its mission to publish new translations by classical scholars of “all the surviving works and major fragments of the Attic Orators” from the classical period. This volume (OCG 10) is the tenth in the series, and the fourth associated with Demosthenes. Four additional volumes (OCG 12-15) will complete the Demosthenic corpus, as well as the series. This review situates the present work within the context of the series and approaches the volume itself from the perspective of its intended audience.

That audience, as Ian Worthington in his “Translator’s Acknowledgments” reminds reviewers to note (ix), is “mostly the student market and the general public” — a reminder intended to preempt criticism related to the omission of detailed scholarly notes to the text.1 Readers desiring to learn more about stylistic or historical matters and controversies are invited to consult the volume’s select Bibliography (135-138), and explore the publications (almost exclusively in English) mentioned there. This review keeps in mind the intended audience for both the series and this volume.

Under the influence of Series Editor Michael Gagarin, the OCG series has delivered accurate and readable translations designed for scholars, students, and general readers who lack Greek. The editors of individual volumes, prompted by Gagarin, have succeeded in limiting scholarly commentary, and in translating style together with substance, binding each passage together with the larger aim of the oration as a whole; that is, rendering rhetorical flourishes with attention to the orator’s intended effect on listeners. Such rigorous efforts to harmonize form and content foreground, without belaboring, the performative aspect of oratory within both the ancient Greek rhetorical tradition and the Athenian tradition of democratic politics.

Most works in the OCG series have been available mainly in the venerable Loeb Classical Library series, an institution approaching its centennial which has dutifully, if not always accurately, pursued its mission to make “the wisdom of the ancients” accessible to “the average reader”. Once completed, the OCG series will supplant (for those who lack Greek) the Loeb editions of ‘the Ten’ Attic Orators, not only in terms of readability and relevance, but also due to the inclusion in each volume of succinct introductions and clear annotations sensitive to recent studies of classical Greek life and culture, Athenian law and democracy, as well as of ancient history, economics, and rhetoric.

The OCG translations — whatever their eventual impact on “the general public” — will become essential reading in courses outside of Classics which study the ancient Greeks. Of special interest to students and teachers of political philosophy will be the translation in this volume of the Demosthenic works that have most suffered through the ages from an unjust neglect.

The first Demosthenes volume included “Speeches 50-59” (OCG 6), many of which are overlooked due to their dubitable authenticity, since they are attributed to Apollodorus, the so-called ‘eleventh’ Attic Orator.2 The second Demosthenes volume, “Speeches 27-38” (OCG 8), introduced readers to the early work of a precocious Demosthenes fighting in Athenian law courts to reclaim his purloined patrimony. Though none of these speeches can be attributed to Demosthenes with certainty, neither can they be denied to him on charges of historical anachronism or stylistic insufficiency. With the third volume of Demosthenes, we stand on firmer and familiar ground: “Speeches 18-19” (OCG 9), “On the Crown” and “On the Dishonest Embassy”.3 These rousing speeches bridge the divide in Demosthenes’ corpus between Assembly (Dem. 1-17) and forensic (Dem. 18-59) speeches, and reveal a vigorous and authentic Demosthenes hard at work in the political and oratorical crucible of Athenian democracy. We hear in them Demosthenes’ impressive array of rhetorical techniques and styles, marshaled not merely for epideictic ends, but with agonistic resolve. The speeches embody the strategic brilliance of Demosthenes as an orator-statesman and are largely responsible for vaulting him to pride of place as the greatest orator of classical antiquity, perhaps of any age.

The fourth Demosthenes volume (OCG 10), on the other hand, is a diverse assortment of obscure works, gathered together by ancient tradition at the end of the Demosthenic corpus : Speeches 60 ( Epitaphios, or “Funeral Oration”) and 61 ( Erôtikos, or “Erotic Essay”); fifty-six “Prologues” ( Prooimia), with striking similarities to some of Demosthenes’ political speeches; and finally, six Letters ( Epistolai), five written from exile on public matters, one linking success in politics to “studying with Plato” (Letter 5.3).4 Though their authenticity has been disputed at times, these writings reveal Demosthenes’ agile intellect and stylistic versatility. Gagarin further contends, in his “Preface” to this volume, that these “relatively little-known works” shed light on Demosthenes as the consummate orator, and on the vicissitudes that eventually overwhelmed him — as well as the Athenian democracy (ix).

The volume opens with Gagarin’s “Series Introduction” (xvii-xxxv). This concise account of the Greek, and especially Athenian, fascination with oratory educates readers about persuasion as a central pillar of Greek culture; from the Homeric epics, down through the practical and intellectual study of rhetoric as a potent technê, to the emergence of formal Aristotelian categories of deliberative, forensic, and epideictic oratory. Gagarin provides readers basic biographical information about the ten orators in the OCG series, followed by a quick survey of the reception history of their speeches as written documents. A section on “Government and Law in Classical Athens” (xxv-xxxii) usefully defines key political and legal terms, in such a way as to situate oratory within its proper context and thus to encourage a proper reading of them among general readers.5 (Gagarin’s introduction is preceded, for the first time in the series, by a list of “Speech Numbers and Titles” for ease of reference to other works in the series, an innovation derived apparently from another work of Worthington.)6

Gagarin’s “Introduction to Demosthenes” (3-7), also reproduced from previous volumes, touches on the Life, Works, and Style of a man who, since antiquity, has been “judged the greatest of the Attic orators” and who “represents the greatest achievement of Greek oratory” (7). The fact that his rhetoric is viewed with suspicion today and dismissed on account of its “patriotic and nationalistic” tone reflects the failure of contemporary political rhetoric to transcend the limited realm of ideology. The recovery of oratory as an inspiring liberal art arguably depends less on this kind of apologetics seeking to justify the “value” of the orators as valid resources for historical, social, political, and legal information about Greek affairs or daily life in the ancient world (see xxv, 6, 8, 56, back cover), and more on the historical, political, and philosophical reflections which will be prompted by sustained reading and serious study of the orations, including the oft-ignored works of Demosthenes translated in this volume.

Worthington’s “Introduction to This Volume” has two main tasks: first, to warn readers that “[s]peeches are not historical but rhetorical works, hence their information has to be treated carefully” — a ‘problem’ that the introduction wants to remedy by making readers aware of the “historical background” which is, he claims, “necessary” to understand “more fully” the Funeral Oration and the Letters (9-16); second, to defend the works in this volume (except the “almost certainly spurious” Erotic Essay) from the disputes over authenticity that have contributed to their neglect (8, 17). Throughout the volume, historical issues receive ample attention and, together with his brief rhetorical analyses (22, 55-56, 114-115), will surely prove helpful to students and general readers. However, the anti-rhetorical sentiment lurking in some of Worthington’s comments betrays an impatience with Demosthenes the orator.7 The introductions to the other volumes of Demosthenes by MacDowell (OCG 8) and Yunis (OCG 9), with their emphatically legal and rhetorical perspectives, should be read as well in order to supplement Worthington’s historical approach and interpretation.

Two examples of the anti-rhetorical tone of his commentary are noteworthy. Readers are first forewarned that, in his Funeral Oration, the orator-statesman has “an axe to grind” (9); later, readers are put on guard by the historian that, in his Letters from exile, Demosthenes is guilty of using “much emotional rhetoric” (106, 113n41), “exploiting the emotions” (115) to move his audience, the Athenian dêmos, to “pity” and recall him. Such qualifications, together with the claim of the apparent necessity to disclose “more fully” the historical background of these works, lead the reader to think that Demosthenes cannot be trusted to convey a reliable account of events — as if historical objectivity, or factual accuracy, is the one and only standard by which to judge the worth of the orator and his oratory.8

With the first example, Worthington implies that Demosthenes masks the devastating defeat of Athenian (and Greek) forces at Chaeronea by referring to the dismal consequences of that battle as “mere ‘present misfortunes'” (24, quoting his translation at 60.35). Calling our attention here to this apparent distortion caused by a rhetorical ‘sleight of hand’ suggests that Demosthenes was concealing the ‘facts’ in order to evade Athenian anger towards him — and “his failed anti-Macedonian policy” — the policy, we are told (and in no uncertain terms), of Demosthenes himself that “resulted in the total defeat of the Greeks” and “the end of Greek autonomy” (24-25, 9-10).9

This impression is of course misleading, for it conceals the historical fact — mentioned only in passing (see 9, 32n32) — that Philip’s “brilliant strategy” and “superior tactics” (to say nothing of Alexander’s youthful daring or the tactical errors made by Theban and Athenian commanders on the battlefield: cf. 60.22), rather than Demosthenes’ “policy” of resistance to Macedonian aggression, caused the “Greek rout” at Chaeronea which, in turn, inevitably “spelled doom” for the Greek poleis. Such an impression also misleads by obscuring the fact that it was not at all inappropriate (or even uncommon in Athenian oratory) for Demosthenes to gesture silently, but poignantly, in his speech towards precisely that harsh reality which, under the epideictic and political circumstances, had to remain unspoken.

Far from being deceptive, his oblique reference to “present misfortunes” ( tas parousas sumphoras) was an apt euphemism, employed to speak of a disastrous event (such as harsh defeat in battle or civil war), wounds from which were too fresh and too painful to be mentioned openly, let alone recalled in detail. Xenophon, in what might be his most famous line, had used this very euphemism to quietly remember that great suffering which surged through the Athenians as news of their final defeat and a humiliating surrender to the Spartans spread from Peiraieus up to the polis — bringing an end to the Peloponnesian Wars and to their freedom ( Hellenika II.2.3).10 It is all-too-fitting, then, that Demosthenes chose this euphemism to begin his peroration in that Funeral Oration praising those who had died nobly in a defeat of such magnitude (60.35; see 18.282-287).11

Worthington does not mention that for Demosthenes, on this occasion, to have spoken more explicitly, delivering nothing but ‘the facts’ in bare historical terms, would certainly have abused the trust that the Athenians invested in him when he was chosen by them to honor in speech those who in deed (whether victorious or defeated) had given the last full measure of devotion for the Athenian (and Greek) cause. Indeed, the decision to award Demosthenes the honor and solemn task of delivering the epitaphios for those who had ‘met their end’ in battle at Chaeronea argues that the Athenians held him in the highest esteem because of — not “despite” (10) — the role played by his persuasion in the years preceding this epoch-making event in Athenian democratic politics and Greek history.12

In his “Introduction” to the Funeral Oration (21-25), Worthington briefly mentions the peculiarly unique character of this rhetorical and political institution of the Athenians, and the signal honor bestowed upon the one chosen to deliver it.13 He then lists the six extant Athenian epitaphioi, and sketches (again, briefly) the generic structure ‘typical’ of such speeches, followed by an outline of Demosthenes’ speech. Most of this commentary is recycled, often verbatim, from an earlier article by Worthington; so, too, the introductions to the Prologues and the Letters.14 Given the bias against ‘rhetoric’ likely to exist in the minds of contemporary readers, attention to historical contextualization — at the expense of extended rhetorical analysis — risks turning the intended audience away from, rather than towards, an engagement with the text itself. Additional pages or paragraphs, for example, contrasting the uniquely Athenian mode of memorializing and burying at home those who died in battle with traditional Greek custom, or linking the appropriation of this aristocratic genre by the democratic Athenian regime, would have strengthened his concise but laconic introduction.

Similarly, the “Introduction” to the Erotic Essay (38-40) comes across as terse, though sound, perhaps due to Worthington’s view that the essay “is almost certainly spurious” because its style is “the most removed from Demosthenes’ other writings” (17). As a generic “rhetorical exercise”, with echoes of love speeches attributed to Plato, Lysias, and Isocrates (said to be “merely commonplaces”), he concludes that it’s “hard to imagine someone like Demosthenes writing this work” (38-40). Whoever the author is (and there is not much beyond stylistic matters to suppose that it isn’t Demosthenes), the essay’s virtues are overshadowed by the insistence on discussing its (hypothetical) composition date and (apparently dubious) authenticity.

General readers will appreciate Worthington’s generic outline of the essay’s contents and his comment on ancient Greek paiderastia. But a reader whose curiosity is piqued by his suggestions that the whole essay is “much influenced” by Platonic thought (38-39) will remain in the dark about how the work emulates and seeks to rival the moral, rhetorical, and philosophical arguments in Plato’s Phaedrus and Symposium. A disappointing note directs such a reader to eight pages of (French) commentary on the subject from the 1974 Budé text, hardly a work ready at hand for undergraduates or the general public. Also perplexing is the fact that while the “roles” of erômenos and erastês are defined (39) and then parenthetically marked in the text when they first appear (61.3), Worthington says nothing about erôs itself, as the desire or longing for transcendence in the human soul aroused by beauty (see 61.11; cf. 45n15) — or about the way ancient Greeks differentiated erotic desire from philia and agapê. The assertion of a “distinction” (39) in Plato’s works between “plain lust” and “spiritual love” (so-called ‘Platonic’ love) is more likely to create, rather than dispel, confusion for readers unfamiliar with the Greek.

In his “Introduction” (55-58) to the Prologues (again drawing off an earlier article), Worthington stresses that these preambles provide us valuable insight into oral performance in the Athenian Assembly and the spirited attachment of the Athenians to both deliberative decorum and dêmokratia, two recurring themes.15 Demosthenes frequently reminds — or educates — his audience about the rules which responsible speakers before the Assembly should obey, standards of conduct which, when observed (by speakers) or enforced (by the Assembly), contribute to prudent deliberations. Respect for democratic institutions and the regime itself ( politeian dêmokratian), the conditio sine qua non of a good orator, resonates like a choral refrain throughout the Prologues. With these preambles, Demosthenes sought to “instruct and persuade” the dêmos (Pr. 7.2), beginning from within the Athenians’ conventional opinions and then guiding their deliberations towards an authoritative consensus about what was best — or rather, necessary (“what must be done”) — for the polis to do, within the limits imposed by “both expediency and justice” (Pr. 40.1).

Moreover, he aimed to do so by means of persuasion alone, without the kind of extra-rhetorical support from traditional sources of authority which made Pericles, for example, such a commanding presence in Athenian politics. Demosthenes’ ultimate task, then, reflected in these political proems, has rightly been viewed as unprecedented: “to address the polis as both rhêtôr and political thinker at once”.16 So Worthington, for good reason, states that Demosthenes’ Prologues “have been unjustly neglected” (57). Their publication here, assisted by Worthington’s annotations and cross-references, should serve as the required propaedeutic to the “dedicated study” of them in English.

The general “Introduction” to the Letters focuses exclusively on questions of their composition date and authorship (99-101). Each of the Letters then has a separate introduction situating it, as much as possible, within a reconstructed historical and political context. Some introductions are rather substantial in length (Letter 3), while others are too thin (Letter 6). The outright dismissal of Letter 5 as a forgery, mainly due to its praise of Platonic education (5.3), seems imprudent. References in the Erotic Essay to a philosophic education as the source of virtue as well as of political wisdom (esp. 61.37, 44, 51), and in the Prologues to those studies which prepare a citizen to advise the Assembly well, suggest that the Letter is consistent with the ennobling Demosthenic conception of oratory as principled persuasion, not sophistic technique.

One drawback of these introductions is that Worthington tends to portray the exiled Demosthenes as so desperate to return to Athenian politics that he “exploited” every chance “to plead his recall” (114). He even goes so far as to speculate that Demosthenes had proposed the extraordinary measure of a “general amnesty” intended to reconcile the rival factions in Athenian politics, not so much to create the grounds for a restoration of political harmony, but calculatingly “in the hope of effecting his return” (102). This reading derives from an uncharitable view of Demosthenes as a “brash and egotistical” opportunist who would “seize any occasion to speak on behalf of himself.”17 Such a cynical interpretation makes all the more difficult the task of encouraging new readers of Demosthenes to discover and reflect on the profound (and enduring) political and philosophical issues grappled with by the orator-stateman.

Turning to the translations, Worthington renders Demosthenes’ Greek into readable and lucid English prose, allowing the texts to speak for themselves in a powerful and direct voice. Much is always lost in translation of course, especially when translating classical works of oratory. Demosthenes’ unrivaled mastery of stylistic variations, which, according to Gagarin, is his “true greatness” (6), inevitably becomes harder to discern when read in any translation, even a good one. Most of the time the translation does not stray from the text, preserving the original order of words and clauses. However, by translating a few key words in Greek, such as kalos and aretê (and their cognates), with a wide range of etymologically unrelated synonyms in English, Worthington deprives attentive readers the insights which follow from discovering reiterations and amplification in the text. Without a consistently literal rendering of certain prominent words, readers without access to the Greek cannot access the subtle variations in the orator’s use of a single word or phrase which in Greek harbors an untranslatable web of meanings and associations. Literalness must be tempered by the goal of readability, lest the text become impenetrable, but without muting the rhetorical cues by which the talented orator signals the presence of fundamental ideas interwoven and embedded in the verbal fabric of his oration.

In the case of orations wrought with a view to appealing to a given audience’s tastes and sensibilities, let alone their opinions or prejudices, the orator’s choice of words should not be lightly altered to produce a more ‘readable’ text. For example, since the ancient Funeral Oration, at its heart, is a civic meditation on “the noble death” ( thanaton kalon : 60.26), even or especially in defeat, it is unfortunate that Worthington does not preserve or note the rhetorical turns of phrase through which Demosthenes transforms mortality and death, that is, the cessation of bodily life, into “immortal” honor and reputation, acquired by actions rooted in the desire to “die nobly” (60.27, 37, 31; cf. 36n49). While the orator speaks in solemn tones of ‘those who accomplished their end’ ( oi teteleutêkotes) — exhorting his listeners to look beyond the mortal remains of the fallen to an “ageless glory” (60.32) which conquers death, the historian callously translates them as “the dead” (60.1, 2, 19, 20, 32). If the purpose of the epitaphios is to honor those who ‘gave the last full measure of devotion’ to “preserve freedom” for the polis, the orator must provide more than the boilerplate “argument that…their deaths had not been needless.” (22) Beyond praising the fallen, it is the living mourning them who the orator must persuade — that those who ‘met their end’ in battle died nobly and thereby won for themselves an everlasting memory of their deeds, a timeless monument in civic memory erected as an exhortation and lesson in virtue for those who remain.18 To insist on speaking of “the dead” blunts the eloquent persuasion of Demosthenes’ argument regarding their immortality and happiness.

Other minor departures from an accurate translation of the Greek seem gratuitous. For example: “to want to set the highest goals” instead of (literally) “desire the most serious things”, or be filled with “ambition” rather than “love of honor” (61.26); to assist the polis in its deliberations, without playing a sycophant, is the job of “people of goodwill” ( eunôn anthrôpôn) not just “loyal citizens” (Pr. 35.2; cf. Pr. 13.1, 61.54); not “wisdom” but “intelligence” ( sunesin) is “the beginning of virtue” (60.17; cf. 60.30), especially in the case of Pericles (61.45), while having “discretion” ( sôphronein), not “wisdom”, is the better part of valor (Pr. 43.2); “the many” ( oi polloi) are not simply “the majority” (Pr. 45.2), nor is “the dêmos” identical to “democracy” (Pr. 42.2; cf. Pr. 2.1, 60.25-26); to account for “virtue” ( aretên) is not the same as praising “many virtues” (61.9) What is gained by abandoning a literal translation in these instances? (Fidelity to the orator’s invocations of the divine fortunately preserves their diversity in context, although dismissive notes on the “exploitation” of oaths and sacrifices forestall inquiry into the reasons for distinguishing his appeals to “Zeus, god of Friendship”, “Zeus of Dodona”, “Persuasion”, and “Athena”; see note 8).

Worthington’s notes to the translations, nevertheless, are frequent and usually helpful, offering historical explanations and occasional glosses of terms, as well as cross-references to Demosthenes’ orations here, and other orations in the series. Given his predilection for an historical approach, it is not surprising that readers are provided with many more notes for the Prologues (97) and Letters (114), than for the Funeral Oration (54) and Erotic Essay (43).

The translator and series editor of this volume are both to be commended for their success in introducing and translating these enigmatic and neglected works of Demosthenes in a manner that will appeal beyond the confines of a narrow academic audience to a broad readership. What reservations are mentioned here should not deter readers of this review, and especially should not deter teachers, from consulting the fine translations and succinct introductions produced by the authors (indeed, “all things are easy to say but not all things are easy to achieve”: Pr. 45.3). The volume admirably attains the high standards set forth in the OCG mission. Students (and, yes, even “the general public”) stand to learn much — both about the ancient Greek world itself, from which political philosophy and our own democracy distantly descend, and about the limitations of political rhetoric in our times — from a serious reading, and rereading, of Demosthenes. REFERENCES

Worthington, I. (ed.). 2000. Demosthenes: Orator and Statesman (Routledge).

Idem. 2003a. “The Authorship of the Demosthenic Epitaphios“, Museum Helveticum 60: 152-157.

Idem. 2003b. “The Authenticity of Demosthenes’ Sixth Letter“, Mnemosyne 56/1: 585-589.

Idem. 2004. “Oral Performance in the Athenian Assembly and the Demosthenic Prooemia“, in Oral Performance and Its Context, ed. C. M. Mackie (Brill): 129-143.

Idem (ed.). 2007. A Companion to Greek Rhetoric (Blackwell).

Notes

1. Similar peremptory remarks reappear in Worthington 2007: x-xi.

2. See the review by Donald Lateiner: BMCR 2004.01.06.

3. See the review by Brad Cook: BMCR 2006.02.58.

4. This volume supersedes the 1949 Loeb edition of the same works by the DeWitts (Dem. VII), the Greek text of which is the basis for the translations herein by Worthington, who consulted for variations the texts of Rennie (OCT, 1931) and Clavaud (Budé, 1974 & 1987).

5. My concern with Gagarin’s Introduction is not its brevity (which is to be expected, in light of the intended audience), but the unintended consequences (for such an audience) of his misleading comment that “amateurism” is the “hallmark” of Athenian political and legal institutions (xxv). This word runs the risk of confusing students and non-academic readers about what must, in fact, have been the very highly sophisticated civic setting within which oratory in Athens flourished and played a decisive role. Gagarin is right to say that Athenian institutions were “resistant to professionalization” (with the exception of the Board of Generals), but the full range of political activity undertaken by an average Athenian cannot be understood if the radical participatory character of direct democracy is not grasped by the readers. Such an impression of “amateurism” blinds readers to the extraordinary political and military success, in both domestic and foreign policy, achieved by Athenian democracy, thus perpetuating (unintentionally) that “elite” (or Platonic: xxx-xxxi) critique of democracy as an inherently flawed regime.

6. See Worthington 2000: x-xiii; see also, Worthington 2007: xiv-xvi. An expanded, complete list of all works translated in the OCG series would be even more useful. Perhaps it will eventually appear as an Appendix to a future volume or as an addition to each volume when the time comes for revised editions.

7. Gagarin himself, on at least one occasion, has noted Worthington’s tendency to read and judge the orators’ works strictly from the disciplinary perspective of history, and thus to exercise an unwarranted level of skepticism and scrutiny; see BMCR 2000.09.10 : “W[orthington]’s judgment is…fueled (I suspect) by his general antipathy to rhetoric” and “[his] strength as a historian proves also a weakness, as he seems unable to understand oratory in any terms except bad history.” Other reasons for disagreeing with Worthington’s approach to (reading and translating) Demosthenes have been registered in this forum: see BMCR 2001.08.28 (with response: BMCR 2001.09.15); BMCR 2001.09.36 (response to: BMCR 2001.09.19); and BMCR 2002.05.24.

8. In addition to an abiding preoccupation with confirming or denying the historical value of oratory, Worthington also sounds the alarm against rhetorical exploitation repeatedly; see, e.g., notes referring to Demosthenes’ “exploiting” the Athenians’ “feelings of superiority” regarding their autochthony (26n13) and democracy (32n34), as well as their “fear of oligarchy” (32n34, 59n13, 87n72). Other notes seek to expose Demosthenes’ “exploitation” of prayers (75n47), oracles (105n14), invocations of demi-gods or semi-divine ancestors (111n34), and oaths as nothing but “common rhetorical trick[s]” (83n64) used by orators in political speeches to sway their apparently superstitious audience. Several topoi are also duly noted as generic or “stock” examples, techniques, and devices said to be either “popular” or “common” (see 27n17, 28n23, 29n24, 36n49, 40n7, 44n14, 62n21, 118n57). Such remarks explain away aspects of Demosthenes’ oratory worthy of serious thought, thus undermining any pedagogic efforts to encourage students (if not the general public) to read these works with care; they also seem to confirm the modern prejudice that rhetoric is nothing but manipulation and deception.

9. This phrase, revived by Worthington (see 2000: 1, 4, 96, 98) has existed for more than a century, but remains problematic. It leads readers to a one-dimensional view of Demosthenes’ oratory and tempts them to interpret him as an opportunistic politician and reckless war-monger willing to exploit the threat of Philip merely for the sake of political expediency. It further implies that the Athenians adopted a fixed “policy” regarding Philip under the influence of Demosthenes, a reading which belies the fluid character of democratic deliberations with respect to both foreign and domestic affairs at Athens (see xxvi, 77n53). Worthington elsewhere argues that “Athenian policy” from 346 to 338 “was that of Demosthenes”; that the failure of “his” policy “had brought Greece to its knees” at Chaeronea; and finally, that “with his anti-Macedonian policy in ruins, Demosthenes committed suicide” (2000: 1, 91, 96, 101).

10. Xenophon also uses the word to describe the democratic punishment of exile, when perceived as unjust ( Hellenika I.1.27); so, too, does Demosthenes (Letter 2.3-8, 12). On the use of sumphora, see A. Wolpert, “Lysias 18 and Athenian Memory of Civil War”, Transactions of the American Philological Association 132 (2002) 120, n36. On the Athenian democratic tradition of “not remembering” political disasters in speech, see esp. N. Loraux, The Divided City: On Memory and Forgetting in Ancient Athens (Zone Books, 2002; originally published in French, 1997).

11. To arouse but soften the blow of a communal meditation on suffering in this way is rhetorically consistent with his invocation of the divine in the form of fate or chance ( tuchê) in order to speak well of those who died, as Worthington notes (31n28, 105n12) in remarking on the passages where the outcome of battle is said by Demosthenes to have been determined by “divine dispensation” (60.19; but cf. Letter 1.13). In his speech “On the Crown” however Demosthenes explicitly names Philip as the “cause” of the calamitous “misfortunes” suffered by the Athenians (himself included) and the Greeks as a whole, in the aftermath of Chaeronea (18.282), before then attributing the loss of lives to divine fate (18.289-290).

12. Worthington’s account seems to first exaggerate Demosthenes’ pre-Chaeronea control over the Athenians (see note 9) and then underestimate his influence during the period from 338 to 324, in which he was awarded honors, won acquittals, and had his exile overturned — despite the “lost credibility” that, in Worthington’s view, he suffered due to “his anti-Macedonian Policy” in the wake of Chaeronea.

13. Worthington quotes in full (21-22) the passage from Thucydides (II.34) detailing the solemnity of the occasion and the Athenians’ selection of one citizen-statesman, both “endowed with wisdom” and “foremost in public esteem”, charged with delivering an “appropriate eulogy” ( epainon ton preponta) at one time for all those who died in war throughout the year. But he does not explicitly direct the readers’ attention to the logical conclusion to be drawn from the Athenian decision to select Demosthenes on this particular occasion, although elsewhere he alludes to the “significance” of that choice; see Worthington 2000: 91; cf. Dem. 18.285 and Plutarch, Dem. 21.

14. See Worthington 2003a, 2003b, 2004. Worthington’s penchant for recycling earlier material has been noted by both Gagarin (BMCR 2000.09.10) and Worthington himself (BMCR 2001.09.19). Much of the discussion of the Harpalus affair in this volume has been treated by Worthington in greater detail elsewhere, including in his “Introduction” to the volume on Dinarchus (OCG 5, 5-10).

15. See Worthington 2004; see also, H. Yunis, Taming Democracy (Cornell University Press, 1996) 287-289.

16. See Yunis 1996: 247, with 237-239, 263.

17. See Worthington 2003a, 156.

18. Worthington, in a note, refers the reader to the work of Loraux ( The Invention of Athens: The Funeral Oration in the Classical City), regarding the genre of epitaphioi (22n1) and authenticity (25n9). But this hardly suffices to introduce the general public and students to the rhetorical and philosophical significance of the Athenian concept of “the noble death” in Demosthenes’ Funeral Oration. Todd’s “Introduction” to Lysias’ oration in this series is only slightly more useful (OCG 2, 25-27); cf. J. Herrman, Athenian Funeral Orations (Focus Publishing, 2004) 1-8. This theme, the apotheosis of those who fall in service to the polis, marks the rhetorical climax of Pericles’ Funeral Oration (Thucydides II.42.4-43.4) and concludes Lysias’ Funeral Oration (2.70-81; see Hyperides 6.24, 27, 41-42). But this peak should be compared with the relative sobriety of Socrates’ Funeral Oration in Plato’s Menexenus (246a-248d) as well as Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address”.