[960] Justin, viii. 5, 6. “Reversus in regnum, ut pecora pastores nunc in hybernos, nunc in æstivos saltus trajiciunt—sic ille populos et urbes, ut illi vel replenda vel derelinquenda quæquæ loca videbantur, ad libidinem suam transfert. Miseranda ubique facies et similis excidio erat,” etc. Compare Livy, xl. 3, where similar proceedings of Philip son of Demetrius (B. C. 182) are described.

[961] See a striking passage in the fourth Philippic of Demosthenes, p. 132.

[962] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 252.

[963] Demosth. Philipp. ii. p. 71, 72. Demosthenes himself reports to the Athenian assembly (in 344-343 B. C.) what he had said to the Messenians and Argeians.

[964] Demosth. Philipp. ii. p. 72.

[965] Demosth. Philipp. ii. p. 66-72. Who these envoys were, or from whence they came, does not appear from the oration. Libanius in his Argument says that they had come jointly from Philip, from the Argeians, and from the Messenians. Dionysius Hal. (ad Ammæum, p. 737) states that they came out of Peloponnesus.

I cannot bring myself to believe, on the authority of Libanius, that there were any envoys present from Philip. The tenor of the discourse appears to contradict that supposition.

[966] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 81, 82. Winiewski (Comment Histor. in Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 140) thinks that the embassy of Python to Athens is the very embassy to which the second Philippic of Demosthenes provides or introduces a reply. I agree with Böhnecke in regarding this supposition as improbable.

[967] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 81. Περὶ δὲ τῆς εἰρήνης, ἢν ἔδοσαν ἡμῖν οἱ πρέσβεις οἱ παρ᾽ ἐκείνου πεμφθέντες ἐπανορθώσασθαι, ὅτι ἐπηνωρθωσάμεθα, ὃ παρὰ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις ὁμολογεῖται δίκαιον εἶναι, ἑκατέρους ἔχειν τὰ ἑαυτῶν, ἀμφισβητεῖ (Philip) μὴ δεδωκέναι, μηδὲ τοὺς πρέσβεις ταῦτ᾽ εἰρηκέναι πρὸς ὑμᾶς, etc.

Compare Demosthen. Fals. Leg. p. 398.

[968] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 81. See Ulpian ad Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 364.

[969] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 81, 84, 85. ἀμφισβητεῖ μὴ δεδωκέναι (Philip contends that he never tendered the terms of peace for amendment) μηδὲ τοὺς πρέσβεις ταῦτ᾽ εἰρηκέναι πρὸς ὑμᾶς ... Τοῦτο δὲ τὸ ἐπανόρθωμα (the second amendment) ὁμολογῶν ἐν τῇ ἐπιστολῇ, ὡς ἀκούετε, δίκαιόν τ᾽ εἶναι καὶ δέχεσθαι, etc.

[970] Hegesippus was much denounced by the philippizing orators at Athens (Demosthen. Fals. Leg. p. 364). His embassy to Philip has been treated by some authors as enforcing a “grossly sophistical construction of an article in the peace,” which Philip justly resented. But in my judgment it was no construction of the original treaty, nor was there any sophistry on the part of Athens. It was an amended clause, presented by the Athenians in place of the original. They never affirmed that the amended clause meant the same thing as the clause prior to amendment. On the contrary, they imply that the meaning is not the same—and it is on that ground that they submit the amended form of words.

[971] Compare Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 77, and the Epistola Philippi, p. 162. The former says, ἔλεγε δὲ καὶ πρὸς ἡμᾶς τοιούτους λόγους, ὅτε πρὸς αὐτὸν ἐπρεσβεύσαμεν, ὡς λῃστὰς ἀφελόμενος ταύτην τὴν νῆσον κτήσαιτο, καὶ προσήκειν αὐτὴν ἑαυτοῦ εἶναι.

Philip’s letter agrees as to the main facts.

[972] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 65. c. 30. περὶ συλλαβῶν διαφερόμενος, etc.

[973] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 78-80.

[974] Epistol. Philipp. ap. Demosth. p. 162. The oration of Pseudo-Demosthenes De Halonneso is a discourse addressed to the people on one of these epistolary communications of Philip, brought by some envoys who had also addressed the people vivâ voce. The letter of Philip adverted to several other topics besides, but that of Halonnesus came first.

[975] Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 446. I take these words to denote, not any one particular outmarch to these places, but a standing guard kept there, since the exposure of the northern frontier of Attica after the peace. For the great importance of Panaktum, as a frontier position between Athens and Thebes, see Thucydides, v. 35, 36, 39.

[976] Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 368, 435, 446, 448; Philippic iv. p. 133; De Coronâ, p. 324; Plutarch, Phokion, c. 16.

[977] The general state of things, as here given, at Oreus and Eretria, existed at the time when Demosthenes delivered his two orations—the third Philippic and the oration on the Chersonese; in the late spring and summer of 341 B. C.—De Chersoneso, p. 98, 99, 104; Philipp. iii. p. 112, 115, 125, 126.

... δουλεύουσί γε μαστιγούμενοι καὶ στρεβλούμενοι (the people of Eretria under Kleitarchus, p. 128).

[978] Demosth. De Chersoneso, p. 99.

[979] Demosth. cont. Aristokrat. p 677. De Fals. Leg. p. 396; De Chersoneso, p. 104, 105.

[980] Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 87.

[981] Demosth. De Chersoneso, p. 93; Pseudo-Demosth. De Halonneso, p. 87; Epistol. Philipp. ap. Demosth. p. 161.

[982] Epistol. Philipp. l. c.

[983] Philippic iii. p. 112.

[984] Philippic iii. p. 118, 119.

[985] Philippic iii. p. 129, 130.

[986] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 252.

[987] Diodor. xvi. 74.

[988] Stephanus Byz. v. Ὠρεός.

[989] Æschines adv. Ktesiphont. p. 67, 68. Æschines greatly stigmatizes Demosthenes for having deprived the Athenian synod of these important members. But the Eubœan members certainly had not been productive of any good to Athens by their attendance, real or nominal, at her synod, for some years past. The formation of a free Euboic synod probably afforded the best chance of ensuring real harmony between the island and Athens.

Æschines gives here a long detail of allegations, about the corrupt intrigues between Demosthenes and Kallias at Athens. Many of these allegations are impossible to reconcile with what we know of the course of history at the time. We must recollect that Æschines makes the statement eleven years after the events.

[990] Epistol. Philipp. ap. Demosth. p. 159.

[991] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. l. c. Æschines here specifies the month, but not the year. It appears to me that Anthesterion, 340 B. C. (Olymp. 109, 4) is the most likely date; though Böhnecke and others place it a year earlier.

[992] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 254, 304, 308. βουλόμενος τῆς σιτοπομπίας κύριος γενέσθαι (Philip), παρελθὼν ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης Βυζαντίους συμμάχους ὄντας αὑτῷ τὸ μὲν πρῶτον ἠξίου συμπολεμεῖν τὸν πρὸς ὑμᾶς πόλεμον, etc.

ἡ μὲν ἐμὴ πολίτεια ... ἀντὶ δὲ τοῦ τὸν Ἑλλήσποντον ἔχειν Φίλιππον, λαβόντα Βυζάντιον, συμπολεμεῖν τοὺς Βυζαντίους μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν πρὸς αὐτὸν (ἐποίησεν) ... Τίς ὁ κωλύσας τὸν Ἑλλήσποντον ἀλλοτριωθῆναι κατ᾽ ἐκείνους τοὺς χρόνους; (p. 255.)

Compare Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 90.

That Demosthenes foresaw, several months earlier, the plans of Philip upon Byzantium, is evident from the orations De Chersoneso, p. 93-106, and Philippic iii. p. 115.

[993] Diodor. xvi. 74.

[994] Epistola Philippi ap. Demosth. p. 163.

[995] That these were the two last causes which immediately preceded and determined the declaration of war, we may see by Demosthenes, De Coronâ, p. 249—Καὶ μὴν τὴν εἰρήνην γ᾽ ἐκεῖνος ἔλυσε τὰ πλοῖα λαβὼν, οὐχ ἡ πόλις, etc.

Ἀλλ᾽ ἐπειδὴ φανερῶς ἤδη τὰ πλοῖα ἐσεσύλητο, Χεῤῥόνησος ἐπορθεῖτο, ἐπὶ τὴν Ἀττικὴν ἐπορεύεθ᾽ ἄνθρωπος, οὐκέτ᾽ ἐν ἀμφισβητησίμῳ τὰ πράγματα ἦν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐνειστήκει πόλεμος, etc. (p. 274.)

[996] Philochorus, Frag. 135. ed. Didot; Dionys. Hal. ad Ammæum, p. 738-741; Diodorus, xvi. 77. The citation given by Dionysius out of Philochorus is on one point not quite accurate. It states that Demosthenes moved the decisive resolution for declaring war; whereas Demosthenes himself tells us that none of the motions at this juncture were made by him (De Coronâ, p. 250).

[997] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 250. It will be seen that I take no notice of the two decrees of the Athenians, and the letter of Philip, embodied in the oration De Coronâ, p. 249, 250, 251. I have already stated that all the documents which we read as attached to this oration are so tainted either with manifest error or with causes of doubt, that I cannot cite them as authorities in this history, wherever they stand alone. Accordingly, I take no account either of the supposed siege of Selymbria, mentioned in Philip’s pretended letter, but mentioned nowhere else—nor of the twenty Athenian ships captured by the Macedonian admiral Amyntas, and afterwards restored by Philip on the remonstrance of the Athenians, mentioned in the pretended Athenian decree moved by Eubulus. Neither Demosthenes, nor Philochorus, nor Diodorus, nor Justin, says anything about the siege of Selymbria, though all of them allude to the attacks on Byzantium and Perinthus. I do not believe that the siege of Selymbria ever occurred. Moreover, Athenian vessels captured, but afterwards restored by Philip on remonstrance from the Athenians, can hardly have been the actual cause of war.

The pretended decrees and letter do not fit the passage of Demosthenes to which they are attached.

[998] Epistol. Philipp. ap. Demosth. p. 165. This Epistle of Philip to the Athenians appears here inserted among the orations of Demosthenes. Some critics reject it as spurious; but I see no sufficient ground for such an opinion. Whether it be the composition of Philip himself, or of some Greek employed in Philip’s cabinet, is a point which we have no means of determining.

The oration of Demosthenes which is said to be delivered in reply to this letter of Philip (Orat. xi), is, in my judgment, wrongly described. Not only it has no peculiar bearing on the points contained in the letter—but it must also be two or three months later in date, since it mentions the aid sent by the Persian satraps to Perinthus, and the raising of the siege of that city by Philip (p. 153).

[999] Epistol. Philipp. ap. Demosth. p. 159, 164; compare Isokrates. Or. v. (Philip.) s. 82.

[1000] How much improvement Philip had made in engines for siege, as a part of his general military organization—is attested in a curious passage of a later author on mechanics. Athenæus, De Machinis ap. Auctor. Mathem. Veter. p. 3, ed. Paris.—ἐπίδοσιν δὲ ἔλαβεν ἡ τοαιύτη μηχανοποιΐα ἅπασα κατὰ τὴν τοῦ Διονυσίου τοῦ Σικελιώτου τυραννίδα, κατά τε τὴν Φιλίππου τοῦ Ἀμύντου βασίλειαν, ὅτε ἐπολιόρκει Βυζαντίους Φίλιππος. Εὐημέρει δὲ τῇ τοιαύτῃ τέχνῃ Πολύειδος ὁ Θεσσαλὸς, οὗ οἱ μαθηταὶ συνεστρατεύοντο Ἀλεξάνδρῷ.

Respecting the engines employed by Dionysius of Syracuse, see Diodor. xiv. 42, 48, 50.

[1001] Diodor. xvi. 74-76; Plutarch, Vit. Alexandri, c. 70; also Laconic. Apophthegm. p. 215, and De Fortunâ Alexan. p. 339.

[1002] Demosth. ad Philip. Epistol. p. 153; Diodor. xvi. 75; Pausanias, i. 29, 7.

[1003] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 14; Plutarch, Vit. X. Orat. p. 848-851. To this fleet of Phokion, Demosthenes contributed the outfit of a trireme, while the orator Hyperides sailed with the fleet as trierarch. See Boeckh, Urkunden über das Attische Seewesen, p. 441, 442, 498. From that source the obscure chronology of the period now before us derives some light; since it becomes certain that the expedition of Chares began during the archonship of Nichomaclides; that is, in the year before Midsummer 340 B. C.; while the expedition of Phokion and Kephisophon began in the year following—after Midsummer 340 B. C.

See some anecdotes respecting this siege of Byzantium by Philip, collected from later authors (Dionysius Byzantinus, Hesychius Milesius, and others) by the diligence of Böhnecke—Forschungen, p. 470 seqq.

[1004] Diodor. xvi. 77: Plutarch, Demosthen. c. 17.

[1005] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 14.

[1006] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 255; Plutarch, De Glor. Athen. p. 350.

[1007] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 305, 306, 307: comp. p. 253. μετὰ ταῦτα δὲ τοὺς ἀποστόλους πάντας ἀπέστειλα, καθ᾽ οὓς Χεῤῥόνησος ἐσώθη, καὶ Βυζάντιον καὶ πάντες οἱ σύμμαχοι, etc.

[1008] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 255, 257. That these votes of thanks were passed, is authenticated by the words of the oration itself. Documents are inserted in the oration, purporting to be the decree of the Byzantines and Perinthians, and that of the Chersonesite cities. I do not venture to cite these as genuine, considering how many of the other documents annexed to this oration are decidedly spurious.

[1009] Demosth. p. 253. Aristonikus is again mentioned, p. 302. A document appears, p. 253, purporting to be the vote of the Athenians to thank and crown Demosthenes, proposed by Aristonikus. The name of the Athenian archon is wrong, as in all the other documents embodied in this oration, where the name of an Athenian archon appears.

[1010] Diodorus (xvi. 77) mentions this peace; stating that Philip raised the sieges of Byzantium and Perinthus, and made peace πρὸς Ἀθηναίους καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους Ἕλληνας τοὺς ἐναντιουμένους.

Wesseling (ad loc.) and Weiske (De Hyperbolê, ii. p. 41) both doubt the reality of this peace. Neither Böhnecke nor Winiewski recognize it. Mr. Clinton admits it in a note to his Appendix 16. p. 292; though he does not insert it in his column of events in the tables.

I perfectly concur with these authors in dissenting from Diodorus, so far as Athens is concerned. The supposition that peace was concluded between Philip and Athens at this time is distinctly negatived by the language of Demosthenes (De Coronâ, p. 275, 276); indirectly also by Æschines. Both from Demosthenes and from Philochorus it appeals sufficiently clear, in my judgment, that the war between Philip and the Athenians went on without interruption from the summer of 340 B. C., to the battle of Chæroneia, in August 338.

But I see no reason for disbelieving Diodorus, in so far as he states that Philip made peace with the other Greeks—Byzantines, Perinthians, Chians, Rhodians, etc.

[1011] Justin, ix. 2, 3. Æschines alludes to this expedition against the Scythians during the spring of the archon Theophrastus, or 339 B. C. (Æschin. cont. Ktesiph. p. 71).

[1012] Æschines cont. Ktesiph. p. 85. c. 80. ἐπιστάτης τοῦ ναυτικοῦ.

[1013] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 260-262. ἦν γὰρ αὐτοῖς (τοῖς ἡγεμόσι τῶν συμμοριῶν) ἐκ μὲν τῶν προτέρων νόμων συνεκκαίδεκα λειτουργεῖν—αὐτοῖς μὲν μικρὰ καὶ οὐδὲν ἀναλίσκουσιν, τοὺς δ᾽ ἀπόρους τῶν πολιτῶν ἐπιτρίβουσιν ... ἐκ δὲ τοῦ ἐμοῦ νόμου τὸ γιγνόμενον κατὰ τὴν οὐσίαν ἕκαστον τιθέναι· καὶ δυοῖν ἐφάνη τριήραρχος ὁ τῆς μιᾶς ἕκτος καὶ δέκατος πρότερον συντελής· οὐδὲ γὰρ τριηράρχους ἔτι ὠνόμαζον ἑαυτοὺς, ἀλλὰ συντελεῖς.

The trierarchy, and the trierarchic symmories, at Athens, are subjects not perfectly known; the best expositions respecting them are to be found in Boeckh’s Public Economy of Athens (b. iv. ch. 11-13), and in his other work, Urkunden über das Attische Seewesen (ch. xi. xii. xiii.); besides Parreidt, De Symmoriis, part ii. p. 22, seq.

The fragment of Hyperides (cited by Harpokration v. Συμμορία) alluding to the trierarchic reform of Demosthenes, though briefly and obscurely, is an interesting confirmation of the oration De Coronâ.

[1014] There is a point in the earlier oration of Demosthenes De Symmoriis, illustrating the grievance which he now reformed. That grievance consisted, for one main portion, in the fact, that the richest citizen in a trierarchic partnership paid a sum no greater (sometimes even less) than the poorest. Now it is remarkable that this unfair apportionment of charge might have occurred, and is noway guarded against, in the symmories as proposed by Demosthenes himself. His symmories, each comprising sixty persons or one-twentieth of the total active twelve hundred, are directed to divide themselves into five fractions of twelve persons each, or a hundredth of the twelve hundred. Each group of twelve is to comprise the richest alongside of the poorest members of the sixty (ἀνταναπληροῦντας πρὸς τὸν εὐπορώτατον ἀεὶ τοὺς ἀπορωτάτους, p. 182), so that each group would contain individuals very unequal in wealth, though the aggregate wealth of one group would be nearly equal to that of another. These twelve persons were to defray collectively the cost of trierarchy for one ship, two ships, or three ships, according to the number of ships which the state might require (p. 183). But Demosthenes nowhere points out in what proportions they were to share the expense among them; whether the richest citizens among the twelve were to pay only an equal sum with the poorest, or a sum greater in proportion to their wealth. There is nothing in his project to prevent the richer members from insisting that all should pay equally. This is the very abuse that he denounced afterwards (in 340 B. C.), as actually realized—and corrected by a new law. The oration of Demosthenes De Symmoriis, omitting as it does all positive determination as to proportions of payment, helps us to understand how the abuse grew up.

[1015] Æschines (adv. Ktesiph. p. 86) charges Demosthenes with “having stolen away from the city the trierarchs of sixty-five swift sailing vessels.” This implies, I imagine, that the new law diminished the total number of persons chargeable with trierarchy.

[1016] Deinarchus adv. Demosthen. p. 95. s. 43. Εἰσί τινες ἐν τῷ δικαστηρίῳ τῶν ἐν τοῖς τριακοσίοις γεγενημένων, ὅθ᾽ οὗτος (Demosthenes) ἐτίθει τὸν περὶ τῶν τριηράρχων νόμον. Οὐ φράσετε τοῖς πλησίον ὅτι τρία τάλαντα λαβὼν μετέγραφε καὶ μετεσκεύαζε τὸν νόμον καθ᾽ ἑκάστην ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ τὰ μὲν ἐπώλει ὦν εἰλήφει τὴν τιμὴν, τὰ δ᾽ ἀποδόμενος οὐκ ἐβεβαίου;

Without accepting this assertion of a hostile speaker, so far as it goes to accuse Demosthenes of having accepted bribes—we may safely accept it, so far as it affirms that he made several changes and modifications in the law before it finally passed; a fact not at all surprising, considering the intense opposition which it called forth.

Some of the Dikasts, before whom Deinarchus was pleading, had been included among the Three Hundred (that is, the richest citizens in the State) when Demosthenes proposed his trierarchic reform. This will show, among various other proofs which might be produced, that the Athenian Dikasts did not always belong to the poorest class of citizens, as the jests of Aristophanes would lead us to believe.

[1017] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 329. Boeckh (Attisch. Seewesen, p. 183, and Publ. Econ. Ath. iv. 14) thinks that this passage—διτάλαντον δ᾽ εἶχες ἔρανον δωρεὰν παρὰ τῶν ἡγεμόνων τῶν συμμοριῶν, ἐφ᾽ οἷς ἐλυμῄνω τὸν τριηραρχικὸν νόμον—must allude to injury done by Æschines to the law in later years, after it became a law. But I am unable to see the reason for so restricting its meaning. The rich men would surely bribe most highly, and raise most opposition, against the first passing of the law, as they were then most likely to be successful; and Æschines, whether bribed or not bribed, would most naturally as well as most effectively stand out against the novelty introduced by his rival, without waiting to see it actually become a part of the laws of the State.

[1018] See the citation from Hyperides in Harpokrat. v. Συμμορία. The Symmories are mentioned in Inscription xiv. of Boeckh’s Urkunden über das Attische Seewesen (p. 465), which Inscription bears the date of 325 B. C. Many of these Inscriptions name individual citizens, in different numbers three, five, or six, as joint trierarchs of the same vessel.

[1019] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 262.

[1020] Chap. xxviii. p. 62 seqq.

[1021] For the topography of the country round Delphi, see the instructive work of Ulrichs, Reisen und Forschungen in Griechenland (Bremen, 1840) chapters i. and ii. about Kirrha and Krissa.

[1022] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 69; compare Livy, xlii. 5; Pausanias, x. 37, 4. The distance from Delphi to Kirrha is given by Pausanias at sixty stadia, or about seven English miles: by Strabo at eighty stadia.

[1023] Æschines, l. c.; Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 277. τὴν χώραν ἣν οἱ μὲν Ἀμφισσεῖς σφῶν αὐτῶν γεωργεῖν ἔφασαν, οὗτος δὲ (Æschines) τῆς ἱερᾶς χώρας ᾐτιᾶτο εἶναι, etc.

[1024] Diodor. xvi. 24; Thucyd. iii. 101.

[1025] Diodor. xvi. 25.

[1026] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 69.

[1027] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 277.

[1028] This must have been an ἀποκατάστασις τῶν ἀναθημάτων (compare Plutarch, Demetrius, c. 13), requiring to be preceded by solemn ceremonies, sometimes specially directed by the oracle.

[1029] How painfully the Thebans of the Demosthenic age felt the recollection of the alliance of their ancestors with the Persians at Platæa, we may read in Demosthenes, De Symmoriis, p. 187.

It appears that the Thebans also had erected a new chapel at Delphi (after 346 B. C.) out of the spoils acquired from the conquered Phokians—ὁ ἀπὸ Φωκέων ναὸς, ὃν ἱδρύσαντο Θηβαῖοι (Diodor. xvii. 10).

[1030] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 70. The words of his speech do not however give either a full or a clear account of the transaction; which I have endeavored, as well as I can, to supply in the text.

[1031] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 277.

[1032] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 69.

[1033] Æschines adv. Ktesiph, p. 70.

[1034] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 277. ὡς δὲ τὸ τῆς πόλεως ἀξίωμα λαβὼν (Æschines) ἀφίκετο εἰς τοὺς Ἀμφικτύονας, πάντα τἄλλ᾽ ἀφεὶς καὶ παριδὼν ἐπέραινεν ἐφ᾽ οἷς ἐμισθώθη, καὶ λόγους εὐπροσώπους καὶ μύθους, ὅθεν ἡ Κιῤῥαία χώρα καθιερώθη, συνθεὶς καὶ διεξελθὼν, ἀνθρώπους ἀπείρους λόγων καὶ τὸ μέλλον οὐ προορωμένους, τοὺς Ἀμφικτύονας, πείθει ψηφίσασθαι, etc.

[1035] Æschin. adv. Ktesiph. p. 70. κραυγὴ πολλὴ καὶ θόρυβος ἦν τῶν Ἀμφικτυόνων, καὶ λόγος ἦν οὐκέτι περὶ τῶν ἀσπίδων ἃς ἡμεῖς ἀνέθεμεν, ἀλλ᾽ ἤδη περὶ τῆς τῶν Ἀμφισσέων τιμωρίας. Ἤδη δὲ πόῤῥω τῆς ἡμέρας οὔσης, προελθὼν ὁ κῆρυξ, etc.

[1036] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 71.

[1037] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 277. According to the second decree of the Amphiktyons cited in this oration (p. 278), some of the Amphiktyons were wounded. But I concur with Droysen, Franke, and others, in disputing the genuineness of these decrees; and the assertion, that some of the Amphiktyons were wounded, is one among the grounds for disputing it: for if such had been the fact, Æschines could hardly have failed to mention it; since it would have suited exactly the drift and purpose of his speech.

Æschines is by far the best witness for the proceedings at this spring meeting of the Amphiktyons. He was not only present, but the leading person concerned; if he makes a wrong statement, it must be by design. But if the facts as stated by Æschines are at all near the truth, it is hardly possible that the two decrees cited in Demosthenes can have been the real decrees passed by the Amphiktyons. The substance of what was resolved, as given by Æschines, pp. 70, 71, is materially different from the first decree quoted in the oration of Demosthenes, p. 278. There is no mention, in the letter, of those vivid and prominent circumstances—the summoning of all the Delphians, freemen and slaves above sixteen years of age, with spades and mattocks—the exclusion from the temple, and the cursing, of any city which did not appear to take part.

The compiler of those decrees appears to have had only Demosthenes before him, and to have known nothing of Æschines. Of the violent proceedings of the Amphiktyons, both provoked and described by Æschines, Demosthenes says nothing.

[1038] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 70. ἐπῆλθε δ᾽ οὖν μοι ἐπὶ τὴν γνώμην μνησθῆναι τῆς τῶν Ἀμφισσέων περὶ τὴν γῆν τὴν ἱερὰν ἀσεβείας, etc.

[1039] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 71. καὶ τὰς πράξεις ἡμῶν ἀποδεξαμένου τοῦ δήμου, καὶ τῆς πόλεως πάσης προαιρουμένης εὐσεβεῖν, etc. Οὐκ ἐᾷ (Demosthenes) μεμνῆσθαι τῶν ὅρκων, οὓς οἱ πρόγονοι ὤμοσαν, οὐδὲ τῆς ἀρᾶς οὐδὲ τῆς τοῦ θεοῦ μαντείας.

[1040] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 275.

[1041] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 69-71.

[1042] Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 71.

[1043] Demosthen. De Coronâ, p. 277; Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 72.

[1044] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 277, 278.

[1045] The chronology of the events here recounted has been differently conceived by different authors. According to my view, the first motion raised by Æschines against the Amphissian Lokrians, occurred in the spring meeting of the Amphiktyons at Delphi in 339 B. C. (the year of the archon Theophrastus at Athens); next, there was held a special or extraordinary meeting of Amphiktyons, and a warlike manifestation against the Lokrians; after which came the regular autumnal meeting at Thermopylæ (B. C. 339—September—the year of the archon Lysimachides at Athens), where the vote was passed to call in the military interference of Philip.

This chronology does not, indeed, agree with the two so-called decrees of the Amphiktyons, and with the documentary statement—Ἄρχων Μνησιθείδης, Ἀνθεστηριῶνος ἕκτῃ ἐπὶ δέκα—which we read as incorporated in the oration De Coronâ, p. 279. But I have already stated that I think these documents spurious.

The archon Mnesitheides (like all the other archons named in the documents recited in the oration De Coronâ) is a wrong name, and cannot have been quoted from any genuine document. Next, the first decree of the Amphiktyons is not in harmony with the statement of Æschines, himself the great mover, of what the Amphiktyons really did. Lastly, the second decree plainly intimates that the person who composed the two decrees conceived the nomination of Philip to have taken place in the very same Amphiktyonic assembly as the first movement against the Lokrians. The same words, ἐπὶ ἱερέως Κλειναγόρου, ἐαρινῆς πυλαίας—prefixed to both decrees, must be understood to indicate the same assembly. Mr. Clinton’s supposition that the first decree was passed at the spring meeting of 339 B. C.—and the second at the spring meeting of 338 B. C.—Kleinagoras being the eponymus in both years—appears to me nowise probable. The special purpose and value of an eponymus would disappear, if the same person served in that capacity for two successive years. Boeckh adopts the conjecture of Reiske, altering ἐαρινῆς πυλαίας in the second decree into ὀπωρινῆς πυλαίας. This would bring the second decree into better harmony with chronology; but there is nothing in the state of the text to justify such an innovation. Böhnecke (Forsch. p. 498-508) adopts a supposition yet more improbable. He supposes that Æschines was chosen Pylagoras at the beginning of the Attic year 340-339 B. C., and that he attended first at Delphi at the autumnal meeting of the Amphiktyons 340 B. C.; that he there raised the violent storm which he himself describes in his speech; and that he afterwards, at the subsequent spring meeting, came both the two decrees which we now read in the oration De Coronâ. But the first of these two decrees can never have come after the outrageous proceeding described by Æschines. I will add, that in the form of decree, the president Kottyphus is called an Arcadian; whereas Æschines designates him as a Pharsalian.

[1046] Demosth. De Coronâ, p. 278.