DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52591#0228
212
WAR MONUMENTS IN DELPHI
rous proposals with respect to modern iweapons of war
would certainly not have been made in any of the bel-
ligerent countries during the recent world-war.
That war then increased robbery and avarice can be
shown by many examples. A typical representative of the
smartness of the day is the orator Andocides. He was of
high Attic nobility, his grandfather had been strategus
with Pericles and Sophocles. When he was involved in the
proceedings about the mutilation of the Hermae, immediately
before the Sicilian expedition, he saved his skin by betraying
his fellow-conspirators, and left Athens much compromised.
Abroad he became an international man of business on a
large scale; during the rule of the Four Hundred he supported
the Attic fleet by contracting, and returned home, but when
the fleet opposed the Four Hundred, had to retire again.
After the end of the war he returned again in 402 B.c., and
sought to bury his past in oblivion by generously supporting
public objects. In 391 b.c. he had gone so far that he was
appointed member of an embassy which was to negotiate
peace with Sparta; but his equivocal attitude produced
a new accusation against him, and for the last time he was
driven into exile. His speeches show him a man of very
average abilities, but he understood the highly valued art
of becoming rich. The other contemporary orator of the
second rank, Antiphon, was an expert man of business, and
regarded it as a matter of course that his clients should be
responsible to him for fees to the amount of 20 per cent,
of the sums involved in the litigation. This gave rise to
a prosecution and an apologia, fragments of which are
preserved in an Egyptian papyrus.1
If we must believe Aristophanes, covetousness took hold
of Athens' great poets. This is what he says of the vener-
able old Sophocles : “ he will do anything for money ! "
" he would actually put out to sea on a straw mat for the
sake of profit! ” The only one who is consistent and dies
in the spirit of old times is Cratinus, the author of a comedy
with the significant name of “ Wine-flask.” He died of
grief, says Aristophanes, at seeing the Spartans invade
Attica and smash to bits a full wine-cask I
J. Nicole, L’Apologie d’Antiphon, Geneve, 1917, p. 25 f.
WAR MONUMENTS IN DELPHI
rous proposals with respect to modern iweapons of war
would certainly not have been made in any of the bel-
ligerent countries during the recent world-war.
That war then increased robbery and avarice can be
shown by many examples. A typical representative of the
smartness of the day is the orator Andocides. He was of
high Attic nobility, his grandfather had been strategus
with Pericles and Sophocles. When he was involved in the
proceedings about the mutilation of the Hermae, immediately
before the Sicilian expedition, he saved his skin by betraying
his fellow-conspirators, and left Athens much compromised.
Abroad he became an international man of business on a
large scale; during the rule of the Four Hundred he supported
the Attic fleet by contracting, and returned home, but when
the fleet opposed the Four Hundred, had to retire again.
After the end of the war he returned again in 402 B.c., and
sought to bury his past in oblivion by generously supporting
public objects. In 391 b.c. he had gone so far that he was
appointed member of an embassy which was to negotiate
peace with Sparta; but his equivocal attitude produced
a new accusation against him, and for the last time he was
driven into exile. His speeches show him a man of very
average abilities, but he understood the highly valued art
of becoming rich. The other contemporary orator of the
second rank, Antiphon, was an expert man of business, and
regarded it as a matter of course that his clients should be
responsible to him for fees to the amount of 20 per cent,
of the sums involved in the litigation. This gave rise to
a prosecution and an apologia, fragments of which are
preserved in an Egyptian papyrus.1
If we must believe Aristophanes, covetousness took hold
of Athens' great poets. This is what he says of the vener-
able old Sophocles : “ he will do anything for money ! "
" he would actually put out to sea on a straw mat for the
sake of profit! ” The only one who is consistent and dies
in the spirit of old times is Cratinus, the author of a comedy
with the significant name of “ Wine-flask.” He died of
grief, says Aristophanes, at seeing the Spartans invade
Attica and smash to bits a full wine-cask I
J. Nicole, L’Apologie d’Antiphon, Geneve, 1917, p. 25 f.