Demosthenes

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Demosthenes : biography

384 BC – 322 BC

According to Pseudo-Plutarch, Demosthenes was married once. The only information about his wife, whose name is unknown, is that she was the daughter of Heliodorus, a prominent citizen.Pseudo-Plutarch, Demosthenes, 847c Demosthenes also had a daughter, "the only one who ever called him father", according to Aeschines’ in a trenchant remark.Aeschines, Against Ctesiphon, His daughter died young and unmarried a few days before Philip II’s death.

In his speeches, Aeschines uses pederastic relations of Demosthenes as a means to attack him. In the case of Aristion, a youth from Plataea who lived for a long time in Demosthenes’ house, Aeschines mocks the "scandalous" and "improper" relation.Aeschines, Against Ctesiphon, In another speech, Aeschines brings up the pederastic relation of his opponent with a boy called Cnosion. The slander that Demosthenes’ wife also slept with the boy suggests that the relationship was contemporary with his marriage.Aeschines, On the Embassy, ; Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, XIII, 63* C.A. Cox, Household Interests, 202 Aeschines claims that Demosthenes made money out of young rich men, such as Aristarchus, the son of Moschus, whom he allegedly deceived with the pretence that he could make him a great orator. Apparently, while still under Demosthenes’ tutelage, Aristarchus killed and mutilated a certain Nicodemus of Aphidna. Aeschines accused Demosthenes of complicity in the murder, pointing out that Nicodemus had once pressed a lawsuit accusing Demosthenes of desertion. He also accused Demosthenes of having been such a bad erastes to Aristarchus so as not even to deserve the name. His crime, according to Aeschines, was to have betrayed his eromenos by pillaging his estate, allegedly pretending to be in love with the youth so as to get his hands on the boy’s inheritance. Nevertheless, the story of Demosthenes’ relations with Aristarchus is still regarded as more than doubtful, and no other pupil of Demosthenes is known by name.Aeschines, On the Embassy, , * A.W. Pickard, Demosthenes and the Last Days of Greek Freedom, 15

Education

Demosthenes Practising Oratory by [[Jean-Jules-Antoine Lecomte du Nouy (1842–1923). Demosthenes used to study in an underground room he constructed himself. He also used to talk with pebbles in his mouth and recited verses while running.Plutarch, Demosthenes, To strengthen his voice, he spoke on the seashore over the roar of the waves.]] Between his coming of age in 366 BC and the trials that took place in 364 BC, Demosthenes and his guardians negotiated acrimoniously but were unable to reach an agreement, for neither side was willing to make concessions.D.M. MacDowell, Demosthenes the Orator, ch. 3 (passim); At the same time, Demosthenes prepared himself for the trials and improved his oratory skill. As an adolescent, his curiosity had been noticed by the orator Callistratus, who was then at the height of his reputation, having just won a case of considerable importance.Plutarch, Demosthenes, According to Friedrich Nietzsche, a German philologist and philosopher, and Constantine Paparrigopoulos, a major Greek historian, Demosthenes was a student of Isocrates;F. Nietzsche, Lessons of Rhetoric, 233–235; K. Paparregopoulus, Ab, 396–398 according to Cicero, Quintillian and the Roman biographer Hermippus, he was a student of Plato.Plutarch, Demosthenes, Lucian, a Roman-Syrian rhetorician and satirist, lists the philosophers Aristotle, Theophrastus and Xenocrates among his teachers.Lucian, Demosthenes, An Encomium, 12 These claims are nowadays disputed. According to Plutarch, Demosthenes employed Isaeus as his master in Rhetoric, even though Isocrates was then teaching this subject, either because he could not pay Isocrates the prescribed fee or because Demosthenes believed Isaeus’ style better suited a vigorous and astute orator such as himself .Plutarch, Demosthenes, Curtius, a German archaeologist and historian, likened the relation between Isaeus and Demosthenes to "an intellectual armed alliance".R. C. Jebb,