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THE speech against Lacritus affords another example of παραγραφὴ or special plea in bar of action. Here, as in the preceding lawsuit, and indeed in that next following, the pleader in bar of action has spoken first, and Androcles, the real claimant, now follows, his object being to show that this is no case for a παραγραφή. The plaintiff had lent money on bottomry to Artemon, a merchant of Phaselis in Pamphylia. Lacritus, the defendant, also of Phaselis (§ 15), was Artemon's brother, and, being present at the transaction, had verbally (it seems) engaged to be responsible for the repayment. Artemon having died without discharging his debt to Androcles, Lacritus is sued, both as the inheritor of his brother's property, and as having pledged himself to see that the loan should be repaid. Lacritus was a Sophist, one of the pupils of Isocrates. The plaintiff taunts him (much in the tone and style in which Aristophanes taunts the professors of wisdom in the “Clouds,”) with perverting his knowledge of right and wrong to evade the just claim now made upon him. Indeed, the prosecutor seems to rely somewhat on the general unpopularity of Sophists for getting a verdict in his own favour (§ 41). The answer of Lacritus is, that Androcles cannot show any written proof or affidavit by which he has become legally liable for his brother's debt; and further, as he has given up the property, he is entitled to be discharged also from any debts upon it. Two parties are concerned as principals on each side, viz.: Androcles of Athens and Nausicrates of Carystus (in Euboea) as lenders, and the brothers Artemon and Apollodorus1, of Phaselis, as borrowers2. The conditions were, that they (the brothers) should sail with goods to Mende or Scione in the peninsula of Pallene (in Chalcidice), take in a specified number of jars of Thracian wine, thence sail to Bosporus (in the Crimea), and after selling the wine, return to Athens with a fresh cargo and so discharge the debt on the double voyage (ἀμφοτεροπλους). The usual conditions were inserted in the contract, that the money should be paid liable only to certain drawbacks in the event of storms, wreck or leakage, capture by pirates, &c. And the security offered was a cargo of wine to be taken in at Mende or Scione, the lenders having the right to take possession, on the return to Athens, of the return-cargo, until the loan should be paid. “It is stated by Androcles, the speaker, that this agreement was violated in several ways by the borrowers; that they failed to ship the stipulated quantity of wine; that they took up a further loan upon the security given to himself and his partner; that they did not purchase a sufficient return-cargo; that, instead of entering into the regular port of Athens, they put into a creek used only by thieves or smugglers; and, when the creditors demanded their money, they and their brother Lacritus falsely represented that the vessel had been wrecked3.” It does not seem clear that Lacritus was legally liable. All that he appears to have done was to have gone with his brothers, as a “referee” or guarantee for their respectability and solvency, to the money-lenders, and to have assured them that it was “all right.” Demosthenes (if indeed he is really the writer of this speech) is somewhat abusive in speaking of Lacritus, and it has been thought he had a personal dislike of or feeling of jealousy against Isocrates, the teacher of Lacritus (see § 40). It is clear that the death of Artemon may have suggested to Androcles the attempt to make Lacritus personally liable, though at first he had trusted to Lacritus' character and credit, and to his influence with his brothers. His general abuse of the merchants of Phaselis (§ 1) implies vexation at a loss rather than consciousness of the justice of his cause. The special plea put in by Lacritus turned, as usual, on a denial that the action was maintainable. He simply denied all complicity, and pleaded that, having resigned his brother's property, he could not be saddled with his debts. And there seems no reason to doubt that this was a fair and just defence. Mr Penrose says “This speech is of uncertain date”; and there appears to be no safe criterion for forming any conclusion in any part of the oration. [But it may be noted (1) that Isocrates, the teacher of Lacritus, is referred to in terms implying that he is still actively engaged as a teacher of Rhetoric (§ 40), while Lacritus himself is already gathering pupils around him (§ 41). Hence the speech may belong to the later years of Isocrates, at any rate before his death in B.C. 338.—(2) We have an express allusion to the prompt settlement of commercial cases during the winter months, a reform probably due to the administration of Eubulus and later in date than 355 B.C., but fully established when the speech on Halonnesus (Or. 7) was delivered, B.C. 343—2. (See § 46n.)—(3) The commercial relations of Athens, in particular the trade with the Euxine, with the islands of the Northern Aegean and the towns of Chalcidice (Mende and Scione), remain unbroken (§§ 10, 35, &c.). These considerations with others, stated in detail by Arnold Schaefer (Dem. und seine Zeit III B 290), point to the period preceding the outbreak of the last war with Philip (B.C. 340—338), and make it probable that the speech may be approximately placed in the year B.C. 341. M. Dareste (Les plaidoyers civils de Dem. I p. 316) suggests B.C. 345. Blass, Att. Ber. III i 503{1} = 564{2}, prefers placing it in 351, the year after the peace between Athens and Chalcidice. We do not know whether Mende and Scione belonged to the Chalcidic federation; but, if so, they must have been destroyed after the fall of Olynthus in 348. Cf. Bohnecke, Forschungen I 154 f, and Schaefer l.c. III 154, note 2.] [Modern Literature. A. Schaefer, Dem. und seine Zeit, III B 286—291, 1858. Blass, die Attische Beredsamkeit, III i 502—507{1}, 562—568{2}. Also the following Dissertations:—(1) I. Hermann, 1853, and (2) R. Duncker, 1877, quoted on p. 4. (3) J. E. Kirchner, de litis instrumentis quae exstant in Demosthenis quae fertur in Lacritum et priore adv. Stephanum orationibus (Halle) 1883, and the Articles on the same subject quoted in note on § 10. (4) P. Uhle, Quaestiones de orationum Demostheni falso addictarum scriptoribus, i, de orat. xxxv, xliii, xlvi—l, lii, liii, lix scriptoribus (Leipzig) 1883 [maintains the common authorship of Or. 35 (Lacrit.), 43 (Macart.), and 48 (Olympiodorus)]. (5) G. Schimmelpfeng, Orationes quae sunt in Macartatum (43) et in Olympiodorum (48) et in Lacriti exceptionem (35)...num unius eiusdemque oratoris esse iudicandae sint Marburg 1887 [ascribes Or. 35 to a different author from that of Or. 43 and 48]. (6) W. H. Kirk, Demosthenic Style in the Private Orations, pp. 38, 39 (Baltimore) 1895.] Argument. εἰσπράττει κ.τ.λ. ‘Endeavours to make his brother Lacritus pay, putting forward two pleas:—(1) that he made the loan to Artemon in the presence of Lacritus and on his promise to be a guarantee; (2) that Lacritus has succeeded to his brother's property.’ παραγράφεται See on 34 § 43 παραγράφονται τὴν δίκην. μηδὲν συμβόλαιον ‘No transaction between himself and Androcles, nor any written bond.’ See Or. 34 § 3, and Or. 41 § 5 ἕως μὲν ὁ Λεωκράτης ἦν κληρονόμος τῶν Πολυεύκτου, πρὸς ἐκεῖνον ἦν μοι τὸ συμβόλαιον. τὸ ἀναδεδέχθαι ‘He denies altogether the having given security for his brother; for, he adds, if he allowed that, he would not have been churlish in regard to the payment in full.’ ἔκτεισιν This is the spelling adopted by Blass, instead of ἔκτισιν, here and elsewhere, viz. 24 §§ 83, 113, 189 bis; 27 § 67; 40 § 56; Ep. 3 § 39. The evidence of inscriptions shows that the Future of τίνω was τείσω, the Aorist ἔτεισα. We find ἐκτείσωσιν before 378 B.C., and the Noun ἔκτεισιν, as well as ἐκτείσωσι, in the age of Alexander (Dittenberger, Sylloge, no. 113). Cf. Meisterhans, Gr. der Att. Inschr. p. 144{2}. S.] οὐκ ὀρθῶς κ.τ.λ. ‘Some critics have wrongly thought this speech is not genuine, deceived by some obscure indications. For the laxity of the diction is not unsuited to private orations; and the oath by Zeus as the ‘King of the gods’ (§ 40) was evidently taken in accordance with the familiar use of the character in the speech.’ Lit. ‘it is clear that he,’ i.e. the author of the speech, ‘has named &c.’ [‘Libanius sets no high value on the above objections, but we cannot so lightly dismiss the suspicion that the style and expression do not bear the stamp of Demosthenes (e.g. οἷα ἐτοιχωρύχησαν οὗτοι περὶ τὸ δάνειον in § 9, and εὐθὺς ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς ἀρξάμενοι in § 27; also the loose and straggling structure of §§ 3, 4 and 7). Again, the piquant wit we here find, strikes us as unlike Demosthenes. Whether he would have spoken so disparagingly of Isocrates in § 40 is difficult to decide; Benseler at any rate doubts it. The strongest objections, however, are the feebleness of the argument even in crucial points of the case, and the wasting of words over irrelevant details, as when (in §§ 47—49) the jurisdiction of the Eleven, the first three Archons and the Generals is described at length, simply to prove that it is no part of their business to settle mercantile matters.’ For these reasons, A. Schaefer (Dem. u. seine Zeit III B 291) agrees with Fynes Clinton (Fasti Hellenici II 357) in thinking that the evidence preponderates against our ascribing the speech to Demosthenes. The same view is also taken by Blass (Attische Beredsamkeit III i 502—4{1}, 562—5{2}), who is led by considerations of style to ascribe the speech to the same writer as those against Macartatus (Or. 43) and Olympiodoius (Or. 48). It is also rejected by M. Dareste, I 316. S.] Boeckh (Publ. Econ. I xxiii), in commenting at some length on this oration, expresses no doubt of its genuineness. ἀπήντηκε The subject is the same as that of δῆλός ἐστιν ὠνομακώς, viz. the composer of the speech, who (Libanius holds) is Demosthenes. The sense is: ‘The writer, I admit, uses rather feeble arguments in meeting and combating the special plea raised on the other side; but the weakness of his reasoning is accounted for by the badness of his case.’ S.] διὰ τὸ πρᾶγμα τὸ πονηρόν i.e. διὰ τὴν πονηρίαν τοῦ πράγματος. The double article however (§ 19) seems here somewhat strangely used. Perhaps we should read, διὰ τὸ πρᾶγμα ὂν πονηρόν, or διὰ τὸ τοῦ πράγματος πονηρόν.
1 [That Apollodorus (as well as Artemon) was a brother of Lacritus may be inferred from § 8 τῶν ἀδελφῶν τῶν ἑαυτοῦ, § 15 οἱ ἀδελφοὶ οἱ τούτου, and 42 τοὺς ἀδελφοὺς τοὺς αὑτοῦ. Nevertheless, in § 7 we have Ἀρτέμωνι τῷ τούτου ἀδελφῷ καὶ Ἀπολλοδώρῳ, and in §§ 3, 15, 36 Artemon alone is named as brother of Lacritus. Artemon is dead (3); and L. is described as his sole heir. It was formerly urged (by Blass, Att. Ber. III i 502{1}) that this would be impossible if Apollodorus also, who is apparently still alive, had been a brother of L. But it is highly probable that L. was not the sole heir, and that Artemon and Apollodorus were both of them brothers of L. (Uhle, i pp. 8, 10). S.]
2 Kennedy inclines to think that the action lay solely between Androcles and Lacritus, as the custom at Athens was to make contracts between parties both joint and several. See on § 34.
3 C. R. Kennedy.
Select Private Orations of Demosthenes, Part I. F. A. Paley, M.A., LL.D., and J. E. Sandys, Litt. D. 1898. Cambridge University Press.
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