Greek Texts & Translations

How it was that the father became so well-to-do I will tell you. There were three brothers in this family, Eupolemus, the gymnastic trainer, Arizelus,the father of the defendant, and Arignotus, who is still living, an old man now, and blind. Of these, Eupolemus was the first to die, before the estate had been divided; next, Arizelus, the father of Timarchus. So long as Arizelus lived, he managed the whole estate, because of the ill-health of Arignotus and the trouble with his eyes, and because Eupolemus was dead. By agreement with Arignotus he regularly gave him a sum of money for his support.

then Arizelus, the father of the defendant Timarchus, died also. In the first years thereafter, so long as the defendant was a child, Arignotus received from the guardians ^[Note] all that one could ask. But after Timarchus was enrolled in the citizens' list, and had come into control of the estate, he thrust aside this old and unfortunate man, his own uncle, and made way with the estate. He gave nothing to Arignotus for his support, but was content to see him, fallen from such wealth, now receiving the alms that the city gives to disabled paupers. ^[Note]

finally—and most shameful of all—when the old man's name had been omitted at a revision of the list of pauper-pensioners, and he had laid a petition before the senate to have his dole restored, the defendant, who was a member of the senate, and one of the presiding officers that day, did not deign to speak for him, but let him lose his monthly pension. ^[Note] To prove the truth of what I say, call,if you please, Arignotus of Sphettus, and read his affidavit.Affidavit

But perhaps someone may say that after selling his father's house he bought another one somewhere else in the city, and that in place of the suburban estate and the land at Alopeke, and the slaves and the rest, he made investments in connection with the silver mines, as his father had done before him. No, he has nothing left, not a house, not an apartment, not a piece of ground, no slaves, no money at interest, nor anything else from which honest men get a living. On the contrary, in place of his patrimony, the resources he has left are lewdness, calumny, impudence, wantonness, cowardice, effrontery, a face that knows not the blush of shame—all that would produce the lowest and most unprofitable citizen.

But it is not only his patrimony that he has wasted, but also the common possessions of the state, your possessions, so far as they have ever come under his control. You see for yourselves how young he is, and yet there is not a public office which he has not held, not one of them by lot or by election, but every one by purchase, in defiance of the laws. The most of them I will pass over, and mention two or three only.

He held the office of auditor, and did the state serious injury by taking bribes from office holders who had been dishonest, ^[Note] though his specialty was the blackmailing of innocent men who were to appear before the auditing board. He held a magistracy in Andros, which he bought for thirty minas, borrowing the money at nine obols on the mina, ^[Note] and thus he made your allies a ready source of supply for his own lusts. And in his treatment of the wives of free men he showed such licentiousness as no other man ever did. Of these men I call no one into court to testify publicly to his own misfortune, which he has chosen to cover in silence, but I leave it to you to investigate this matter.

But what do you expect? If a man at Athens not only abuses other people, but even his own body, here where there are laws, where you are looking on, where his personal enemies are on the watch, who would expect that same man, when he had received impunity and authority and office, to have placed any limit on his license? By Zeus and Apollo, many a time before now have I marvelled at the good fortune of your city, shown on many other occasions, but not least in this, that in those days he found nobody to whom he could sell the state of Andros!

But, you say, although he was worthless when he held office alone, yet when he was associated with others he was all right! How so? This man, fellow citizens, became a member of the senate in the archsonship of Nicophemus. ^[Note] Now to recount all the rascalities of which he was guilty in that year would be too large an undertaking for the small fraction of a day; but those which are most germane to the charge that underlies the present trial, I will relate in a few words.

in the same year in which Timarchus was a member of the senate, Hegesandrus, the brother of Crobylus, was a treasurer of the funds of the goddess, ^[Note] and together, in right friendly comradeship, they were in the act of stealing a thousand drachmas which belonged to the city. But a reputable man, Pamphilus of the deme Acherdous, who had had some trouble with the defendant and was angry with him, found out what was going on, and at a meeting of the assembly arose and said, “Fellow citizens, a man and a woman are conspiring to steal one thousand drachmas of yours.”