PARA´STASIS
PARA´STASIS (
παράστασις), a fee of one drachm paid to an arbitrator by the
plaintiff, on bringing his cause before him, and by the defendant, on
putting in his answer; likewise on making an application for delay, and
probably also on making a counter-affidavit (Pollux, 8.39, 127; Harpocr.
s.v. cf. [Dem.]
c. Timoth. p. 1190.19; Photius and
Etym. M. s. v.
παρακατάστασις). Meier (
Privatschiedsrichter,
etc. p. 13 f.) is of opinion that the state received these fees, and out of
them paid the public arbitrators a drachm for every day they were engaged in
their official duties; yet both Pollux and Harpocration use the expression
λαμβάνειν of the arbitrator.
The same name was given to the fee (probably a drachm) paid to the state by
the prosecutor in certain public causes. Aristotle (in Harpocr. s. v.)
mentions as
γραφαὶ to be laid before the
thesmothetae those in which this fee had to be paid, viz.
ξενίας, δωροξενίας, φευδεγγραφῆς, ψευδοκλητείας,
βουλεύσεως, ἀγραφίου and
μοιχείας: and from Andoc.
de Myst. §
120, we learn that
παράστασις had to be
paid by one who claimed an heiress in marriage as having a better title than
another. On the other hand, this fee was not paid in an
εἰσαγγελία κακώσεως ἐπικλήρων (Isae.
Pyrrh. § 45), nor probably in a
γραφὴ ὕβρεως (Isocr.
Lochit.
§ 2). (
Att. Process, ed. Lipsius, p. 813 f.)
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C.R.K] [
H.H]