[14]
Evidence has
been submitted to you, men of Athens, that they1
granted a lease to these men also, and gave over to them no private
banking-capital; and that they gave them their freedom,2 as if having received great benefits from them; and at that
time they went to law neither with them nor with Phormio. Indeed, as long as his
mother was living, who had an accurate knowledge of all these matters,
Apollodorus never made any complaint against Phormio, the defendant; but after
her death he brought a malicious and baseless suit claiming three thousand
drachmae in money, in addition to two thousand drachmae which she had given to
Phormio's children,3 and a bit of underwear and a serving-girl.
1 The plural denotes the two brothers, Apollodorus and Pasicles.
2 These men would appear to have been slaves originally, and, like Phormio himself, were rewarded with emancipation. The alternative rendering, “freed them from all claims,” seems less probable.
3 Children, that is, whom she had borne to Phormio.
Demosthenes. Demosthenes with an English translation by A. T. Murray, Ph.D., LL.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1939.
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