John Edwin Sandys

“ A private suit could only be brought by the man directly interested, or, in the case of a slave, a ward or an alien, by the master, guardian or patron respectively; and, if the suit were successful, the sum claimed generally went to the plaintiff. Public actions may be divided into ordinary criminal cases, and offences against the state. ”

“ A translator of Aristophanes, Mr B. B. Rogers, records his opinion “that it would be difficult to devise a judicial system less adapted for the due administration of justice” (Preface to Wasps, xxxv. f.) , while a translator of Demosthenes, Mr C. R. Kennedy, observes that the Athenian jurors “were persons of no legal education or learning; taken at haphazard from the whole body of citizens, and mostly belonging to the lowest and poorest class. On the other hand, the Athenians were naturally the quickest and cleverest people in the world. Their wits were sharpened by the habit . ”

“ Mercantile cases had to be decided within the interval of a month; others might be postponed for due cause. If, on the day of trial, one of the parties was absent, his representative had to show cause under oath (ὑπωμοσία) ; if the other party objected, he did so under oath The trial. (ἀνθυπωμοσία) . If the plea for delay were refused by the court, and it were the defendant who failed to appear, judgment went by default; in the absence of the plaintiff, the case was given in favour of the defendant.
The official who had conducted the preliminary inquiry also presided at the trial. ”

“ Adoption is made by the simple procedure of mounting a block of stone in the market-place and making a public announcement at a time when the citizens are assembled. The adopted son does not inherit any larger share than that of a daughter. ”

“ Law was first reduced to writing in the 7th century B.C. A written code is a necessary condition of just judgment, and such a code was the first concession which the people in the Greek cities extorted from the ruling aristocracies. ”

“ The law-courts gradually superseded most of the ancient judicial functions of the council and the assembly, but the council continued to hold a strict scrutiny (δοκιμασία) of candidates for office or for other privileges, while the council itself, as well as all other officials, had to Jurisdiction of the council and assembly.
Eisangelia. give account (εὔθυνα) on ceasing to hold office. The council also retained the right to deal with extraordinary crimes against the state. It was open to any citizen to bring such crimes to the knowledge of the council in writing. ”

“ Charondas, the “disciple” of Zaleucus, became the lawgiver, not only of his native town of Catana on the east coast of Sicily, but also of other Chalcidian colonies in Sicily and Italy. The laws of Charondas were marked by a singular precision, but there was nothing (says Aristotle) that he could claim as his own except the special procedure against false witnesses (Politics, ii. 12. 11) . In the case of judges who neglected to serve in the law courts, he inflicted a large fine on the rich and a small fine on the poor (ib. vi. (iv.) 13. 2) . Androdamas of Rhegium gave Androdamas of Rhegium. ”

“ Any one who desires to repudiate his adopted son makes a public announcement as before, and the person repudiated receives, by way of nominal compensation, the gift of a small number of staters. In these later “laws of Gortyn” we have reached the time when payments are made, not in “caldrons,” but in coins. In the inscription itself the laws are simply described as “these writings.”
The text of the great inscription was first published by E. Fabricius in Ath. ”

“ Imprisonment before trial was common, Penalties. and persons mulcted in penalties might be imprisoned until the penalties were paid, but imprisonment was never inflicted as the sole penalty after conviction. Foreigners alone could be sold into slavery. Sentences of death were carried out under the supervision of the board of police called the “Eleven.” In ancient times a person condemned was hurled into a deep pit (the barathrum) in a north-western suburb of Athens. ”

“ They deal with the powers of the magistrates and the observances of religion, but are mainly concerned with private matters of barter and sale, dowry and adoption, inheritance and succession, fines for trespass and questions of blood-money. As in the code of Zaleucus, we have a fixed scale of penalties, including the fine of a single tripod, and ranging from one to a hundred caldrons. ”

“ It seems probable that they dealt with all private suits not otherwise assigned, but, unlike the archons, they did not prepare any case for the court but referred it, in the first instance, to a public arbitrator appointed by lot (c. 53) . [3]
The public arbitrators (διαιτηταί) were a body including all Athenian citizens in the sixtieth year of their age. The arbitrator, on receiving the case from the four representatives of the Forty, first endeavoured to bring the parties to an agreement. ”

“ In contrast with these primitive elements we have others which are distinctly progressive. The estates of husband, wife and sons are regarded as absolutely distinct. Wills are unknown, even in their most restricted form. ”

“ A trial for homicide is one of the scenes represented on the shield of Achilles (Il. xviii. 497-508) . The folk are here to be seen thronging the market-place, where a strife has arisen between two men as to the price of a man that The trial scene. has been slain. ”

“ Charondas at Catana, etc. and confusion, though we know little of his laws, except that they attached definite penalties to each offence, and that they strictly protected the rights of property. Two centuries later, his code was adopted even by the Athenian colony of Thurii in south Italy (443 B.C.) . ”

“ The change was generally effected with the aid of a Era of written laws. single legislator entrusted with complete authority to draw up a code.
The first communities to reach this stage of progress were the Greek colonies in the West. The Epizephyrian Locrians, near the extreme south of Italy, received the earliest written code from Zaleucus (663 B.C.) , whose strict and severe legislation put an end to a period of strife Zaleucus at Locri Epizephyrii. ”

“ L. Beauchet, Droit privé de la rép. athén. (4 vols., Paris, 1897) ; C. R. Kennedy, Appendices to transl. of Dem. vols. iii. and iv. (1856–1861) ; Smith’s Dictionary of . . . Antiquities, ed. 3 (1891) ; F. B. Jevons, in Gardner and Jevons, Greek Antiquities (1895, pp. 526-597) ; W. Wyse, in Whibley’s Companion to Greek Studies (Cambridge, 1905) , pp. 377-402. (J. E. S.*)
↑ For further information as to the evolution of the Athenian constitution see Archon, Areopagus, Boulē, Ecclesia, Strategus, and articles on all the chief legislators. ”