HYPERIDES’ AGAINST DIONDAS

AND THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT

JUDSON HERRMAN

This paper considers the new fragment of Hyperides’ speech Against Diondas within the
broader historical and rhetorical context of the 330s and 320s. The best known speeches
from the late 330s, Demosthenes’ On the Crown and Lycurgus’ Against Leocrates, evince a
patriotic view of the battle of Chaeronea and ignore later realities of the 330s. The speech
Against Diondas similarly depicts the policy that led to defeat in 338, but unlike the
speeches of Demosthenes and Lycurgus it also explicitly acknowledges the consequences of
the battle for Athens. In the speech Against Diondas, which was delivered in 334, Hyperides
is noticeably attuned to the conditions imposed on Greece by the League of Corinth; this
attention to current circumstances links the speech to two other orations of the period:
[Demosthenes] 17, an assembly speech from a debate on the terms of the treaty with
Alexander, probably from the year 331, and Hyperides’ Funeral Oration, delivered in 322 at
the end of the first season of the Lamian War. This paper traces the theme of revolt from
Macedonian control as it emerges and develops in these three speeches.
To be sure, the striking similarities between On the Crown and the new fragment Against
Diondas are undeniable, and it is precisely this close connection that makes Hyperides’
topical references to the events of the 330s remarkable. In On the Crown Demosthenes
presented a new approach to defeat. Unsurprisingly, Athenian public culture preferred to
commemorate victories and avoided dwelling on defeat. In contrast to the countless
examples of victory monuments, both physical and verbal, accounts of defeat are rare. The
punishment of Phrynichus for producing a play on the Capture of Miletus nicely exemplifies
this traditional unease about narrating misfortunes. But after the loss at Chaeronea in 338,
Demosthenes proudly avowed the policy that brought about the death of a thousand
Athenians at Chaeronea and ended its independence in foreign policy. Whereas earlier
rhetores and strategoi were regularly prosecuted for failed policy and defeat in the field,
after the battle of Chaeronea Demosthenes was chosen to deliver the speech over the dead.
At the same time, the general Lysicles was found guilty and executed for his role in the
catastrophe. 1 Two years later, in his prosecution of Ctesiphon, Aeschines hoped to similarly
blame Demosthenes for the political policy that led to the battle, 2 but when the case was
heard in 330, Demosthenes successfully defended his political leadership.
The new fragment of the Against Diondas shows that Demosthenes was not the only
prominent politician during the years after the battle who was defending the decision to fight
in 338, and that the Athenian demos confirmed its support for Demosthenes and his policies

1
Diod. Sic. 16.88.
2
E.g., Aesch. 3.158.

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176 BICS-52 – 2009

on numerous occasions during the interval between the battle and the trial of Ctesiphon in
330. Hyperides catalogues a large number of prosecutions of Demosthenes and other anti-
Macedonian politicians in Athens, adding more detail to the previously known account of
Demosthenes, who also referred to the legal attacks on himself in ‘the first days’ after
Chaeronea, naming Diondas among others. 3 Hyperides characterizes Diondas as a paid
sycophant working for Philip, who repeatedly harassed the leading anti-Macedonian
politicians in the Athenian courts. Diondas, about whom nothing aside from his prosecution
of Hyperides was previously known, is now said to have initiated some fifty failed cases, not
only against Hyperides (three in one day supposedly), but also against other well-known
leaders: Demosthenes (fifteen times, according to Hyperides), Lycurgus and Charidemus. 4
Diondas’ failure in all of these cases is new evidence that the broad position of
unaccommodating antagonism toward Macedon, which was taken by politicians such as
Demosthenes and Hyperides, was repeatedly persuasive to the Athenian judges.
It will now be useful to illustrate briefly the depiction of this broad position as
presented in the speeches On the Crown and Against Leocrates, in order to highlight some
unique aspects of Hyperides’ approach in the Against Diondas. Aeschines’ prosecution
speech Against Ctesiphon in 330 blames Demosthenes for missed opportunities during the
330s. After a dramatic lamentation for the city of Thebes, 5 Aeschines provides a narrative
of the ‘fourth period’ of Demosthenes’ career, the period since Chaeronea. He starts with
Demosthenes’ role as an ambassador to overseas allies immediately after the battle, and
then turns to Demosthenes’ failed role as ambassador to Alexander after the death of
Philip, and then proceeds to attack Demosthenes for not doing more when Alexander was
just beginning the Persian campaigns in 334, or when Alexander was vulnerable before
the battle of Issus in 333, or most recently, when Agis’ revolt broke out in 331. 6 But
Demosthenes resolutely avoids discussing the period after Chaeronea. Early in his speech
he vaguely alludes to the fall of Thebes as the city’s ‘present misfortunes’ (παρούσαι
συμφοραί), and then cuts himself off and suggests that he may return to that topic later. 7
But in the end Demosthenes chooses not to respond to any of Aeschines’ charges
regarding the events after Chaeronea. He might easily have presented his activity during
the Theban revolt in a positive light, since he spoke on behalf of the cause in the assembly
and sent arms, 8 and it is easy to imagine a persuasive response to Aeschines’ hazy
allegations regarding the later period. Perhaps Demosthenes prefers to avoid all of this
because it is irrelevant to the specific legal issue at hand, but if so, he does not bother to
explain his reasoning. Some modern accounts have suggested that Demosthenes was

3
Dem. 18.249.
4
Hyp. Against Diondas 145r/144v 9–22 (all quotations of this speech are from C. Carey et al., ‘Fragments of
Hyperides’ Against Diondas from the Archimedes Palimpsest’, ZPE 165 [2008] 1–19): ∆ιώνδας δὲ νῦν ἐν
πεντήκοντα γραφαῖς, ἃς ἐγράψατο, κατὰ μὲν τῶν ὑπὲρ Φιλίππου πολιτευομένων οὐδεμίαν πώποτε γραφὴν
ἀπήνεγκεν...ἐγράψατο δὲ Χαρίδημον μέν...Λυκοῦργον δὲ...∆ημοσθένη τε πλείους ἢ πέντε καὶ δέκα γραφὰς
ἐγράψατο, κατ’ ἐμοῦ δὲ τρεῖς τῆι αὐτῆι ἡμέραι ἀπήνεγκεν...
5
Aesch. 3.133.
6
Aesch. 3.159–67.
7
Dem. 18.40–42.
8
Diod. Sic. 17.8.6–7; Plut. Dem. 23.1–2.
 JUDSON HERRMAN: AGAINST DIONDAS – THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT 177

vulnerable because of his hesitancy to support the failed revolt, while others have deemed
Agis’ chances as hopeless, even if Athens did join the cause, and praised Demosthenes’
hesitation. 9 But again Demosthenes offers no excuse or explanation for his silence on
recent events.
Of course factors such as the defeat of Agis and the success of Alexander probably
guided Aeschines’ decision to bring the case to trial in 330, and that fact explains the
prominence of recent events in his prosecution speech. Demosthenes however adopts a
completely different rhetorical strategy. Like Aeschines, he considers the entirety of his
long career as an opponent of Philip, but whereas Aeschines focuses on the recent results
of Demosthenes’ policy, Demosthenes instead presents the battle of Chaeronea as the
culmination of his career, and also of the long tradition of Athenian sacrifices for the other
Greeks. Demosthenes casts himself as the prescient opponent of Philip, and attention to
events after the king’s death would only muddy the waters of this clear and effective
rhetoric. 10 He defends the policy that led the Greeks to defeat at Chaeronea by likening
the Athenian campaign against Philip to earlier efforts to protect Greece during the
Persian Wars. Demosthenes declares that those who died at Chaeronea chose to sacrifice
themselves for the good of the state, just as their forefathers did at Marathon, Artemisium,
Salamis, and Plataea, and that they must all be honored together, regardless of the
outcome of their efforts. 11 He successfully deflects complaints about his leadership by
presenting the battle as a moral obligation and attributing the defeat to the gods and fate. 12
Harvey Yunis has emphasized the tragic nature of Demosthenes’ appeal, that he presents
an inescapable moral obligation, against which military and political realities carry little
weight. 13 By presenting the Athenian sacrifice at Chaeronea as a modern-day Marathon or
Salamis, Demosthenes can ignore the consequences of the battle. As he said in his
Funeral Oration just after the battle in 338, the bravery of those who died is all that
matters, not the defeat. 14
Demosthenes’ famous speech On the Crown was not alone in its emphasis on the
campaign against Philip. Lycurgus’ Against Leocrates, delivered in 331, 15 the same year as
Agis’ revolt and a year before On the Crown, similarly focuses on Chaeronea and pays little
attention to more recent events, aside from passing descriptions of Leocrates’ activities
abroad. For example, at the center of the speech Lycurgus presents a brief epitaphios logos

9
G. L. Cawkwell, ‘The crowning of Demosthenes’, CQ 19 (1969) 163–80, at 180, suggests that ‘Demosthenes
maintained a careful silence about recent events’ in On the Crown because he ‘misjudged the situation’ during
Agis’ revolt. For sceptical responses, see I. Worthington, ‘Demosthenes’ (in)activity during the reign of
Alexander the Great’, in I. Worthington (ed.), Demosthenes: statesman and orator (London and New York
2000) 90–113, at 97–98 and E. M. Harris, Aeschines and Athenian politics (New York and Oxford 1995) 173.
10
When Alexander is named in On the Crown, he is always explicitly paired with Philip (18.51–52, 270, 296,
297); Demosthenes only brings him up to emphasize the continuity of Philip’s rule.
11
Dem. 18.208.
12
Dem. 18.192–93.
13
H. Yunis, ‘Politics as literature: Demosthenes and the burden of the Athenian past’, Arion 8 (2000) 97–118.
14
Dem. 60.19. On the authenticity of the speech, see J. Herrman, ‘The authenticity of the Demosthenic Funeral
Oration’, AAntHung 48 (2008) 171–78.
15
On the date see E. M. Harris in I. Worthington et al., Dinarchus, Hyperides, and Lycurgus (Austin 2001) 159
n. 1.
178 BICS-52 – 2009

in praise of the dead of the battle of Chaeronea, in which he emphasizes their sacrifice as a
victory, just as Demosthenes did in his funeral oration. 16 In this speech Lycurgus’ primary
point is to demonstrate that Leocrates betrayed the city in the days after the battle, and so
perhaps he feels even less pressure than Demosthenes, who might perhaps have been
expected to answer Aeschines’ charges regarding recent events, to consider later develop-
ments. Whatever their reasons, in their speeches delivered years after the battle both
Demosthenes and Lycurgus seem unable to move beyond that event. Lycurgus’ arguments
in 331 have not developed much since the days immediately after the battle, when he
prosecuted the general Lysicles, one of the three leaders at Chaeronea, and the Areopagite
Autolycus, who, like Leocrates, fled the city in the chaotic aftermath of the defeat, 17 and we
can see from the surviving fragments of the speech Against Autolycus that Lycurgus’
accusations of Leocrates in 331 rested on many of the same increasingly tired arguments that
he made years before in 338, when for instance he accuses Leocrates of abandoning
ancestral graves and leaving Athens to become open pasture after Philip destroys the city. 18
Both the speech Against Leocrates and On the Crown link Athenian policy at Chaeronea
with the great Athenian successes during the Persian Wars, and both present a nostalgic and
patriotic version of the campaign against Philip. Demosthenes and Lycurgus adopt a similar
moral religious tone, as can be seen, for example, in the solemn prayers that strikingly begin
each of these two speeches, 19 and in doing so both orators forget about the mundane recent
realities of events after Chaeronea.
The arguments of Hyperides’ Against Diondas overlap with those of On the Crown.
Indeed, before the discovery of the new fragments, in his Praeparatio Evangelica
(composed in the early fourth century AD) the Christian apologist Eusebius quoted
Porphyry on the topic of literary plagiarism, who suggested that in the Against Diondas
Hyperides stole material from Demosthenes. 20 Now, in the new fragments, it seems clear
that Porphyry referred to On the Crown, for in the first edition of the new text the editors
have noted several instances in which Hyperides’ specific phrasing, examples, and
arguments closely correspond to passages of On the Crown. 21 More generally, the speech

16
Lycurg. 1.48–50; cf. Lycurg 1.49 and Dem. 60.19. P. Maas, ‘Zitate aus Demosthenes’ Epitaphios bei
Lykurgos’, Hermes 63 (1928) 258–60, observes further parallels in the two accounts.
17
For the testimonia to the cases, see M. H. Hansen, Eisangelia: the sovereignty of the people’s court in Athens
in the fourth century BC and the impeachment of generals and politicians (Odense 1975) nos. 112, 113.
18
See E. M. Harris in Worthington et al., Dinarchus, Hyperides, and Lycurgus (n. 15, above) 207, on Lycurg. frr.
3.2 and 3.3 (Conomis). D. Whitehead, ‘Absentee Athenians: Lysias Against Philon and Lycurgus Against
Leocrates,’ MH 63 (2006) 132–51, at 143–44, also discusses parallels between the speeches.
19
Dem. 18.1–2 with H. Yunis, Demosthenes. On the Crown (Cambridge 2001) 105–06 ad loc. on other prayers
in the speech; Lycurg. 1.1–2. Whitehead, ‘Absentee Athenians’ (n. 18, above) 142–47, emphasizes the pious
tone throughout Lycurgus’ speech.
20
Eusebius, PE 10.3.14–15 (Mras 1.564 = Hyp. fr. 95 [Blass-Jensen]): μηνύω καὐτὸς Ὑπερείδην τὸν καλὸν
πολλὰ παρὰ ∆ημοσθένους κεκλοφότα ἔν τε τῶι Πρὸς ∆ιώνδαν λόγωι...καὶ ὅτι μὲν ὁ ἕτερος παρὰ τοῦ ἑτέρου
μετέθηκε πρόδηλον· συγχρονούντων δ’ αὐτῶν, ἡμῶν μὲν ἂν εἴη ἔργον...ἐκ τῶν χρόνων ἀνιχνεῦσαι τὸν κλέπτην.
ἐγὼ δὲ ὑποπτεύω μὲν τὸν ὑφηιρημένον εἶναι τὸν Ὑπερείδην· ἀδήλου δὲ ὄντος ὁπότερος, ἄγαμαι μὲν
∆ημοσθένην, εἰ λαβὼν παρὰ Ὑπερείδου πρὸς δέον διώρθωσε· μέμφομαι δὲ τὸν Ὑπερείδην, εἰ λαβὼν παρὰ
∆ημοσθένους πρὸς τὸ χεῖρον διέστρεψε.
21
For examples, see C. Carey et al., ‘Fragments of Hyperides’ Against Diondas from the Archimedes
Palimpsest’ (n. 4, above) 3.
 JUDSON HERRMAN: AGAINST DIONDAS – THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT 179

Against Diondas concentrates on the moral imperative to fight at Chaeronea, just as On

the Crown and Against Leocrates do, and Demosthenes and Hyperides employ the same
broad defensive strategy. Demosthenes attributed the defeat at Chaeronea to ‘chance’
(τύχη), both in his Funeral Oration immediately after the battle and eight years later in On
the Crown, and Hyperides likewise attributes the battlefield outcome of Demosthenes’
policy to chance. 22 In On the Crown Demosthenes defended the terms of the alliance with
Thebes in 338 by comparing it to the Athenian contribution to the Greek alliance during
the Persian Wars at the battle of Salamis, and now Hyperides makes exactly the same
argument. 23 These ‘borrowings’, as Porphyry termed them, between the Against Diondas
and On the Crown are conspicuous evidence of a collaborative link between Hyperides
and Demosthenes, both in details of presentation and in broad argumentative strategy.
But whereas Demosthenes pays very little attention to events after 338, 24 Hyperides, in
an extract that is very short in comparison with On the Crown, several times points to the
specific consequences of that battle for Athens in the 330s. Diondas’ prosecutions, which
Hyperides lists at length, were considered above; this information serves as new evidence
for political factionalism in the 330s, with some groups of anti-Macedonian politicians,
such as Demosthenes, Hyperides, and Lycurgus facing off against those who would
advocate a more conciliatory policy, such as Aeschines or Demades. It is striking that
Hyperides’ speech is closer to Aeschines’ prosecution speech Against Ctesiphon than to
the defense speech On the Crown in its acknowledgment of the exiled Thebans present in
Athens. Just as Aeschines laments the destroyed city, Hyperides also expresses regret that
the exiles are in Athens with ‘time to spare’ because their city has been destroyed. 25 The
new fragment can be dated to some time in 334 at the earliest precisely because Hyperides
refers to several specific events of the 330s. For example, he complains about the
contributions demanded by Alexander for his expedition to Persia, using the two forceful
epi-compounds ἐπιστέλλω and ἐπιτάττω to emphasize the unequal terms of the League of
Corinth, and Diondas’ role as a toady to the hegemon Alexander. 26
Like On the Crown, the speech Against Diondas is primarily concerned with
Demosthenes’ policy before the battle of Chaeronea, but these repeated notices of the

22
Hyp. Against Diondas 137v/136r 2–8: δεῖ δὲ τῶν κινδύνων πάντων τὰς μὲν ἀρχὰς καὶ τὰς ὑποθέσεις εἰς τοὺς
πράττοντας ἀναφέρειν, τὰ δ’ ἐκ τούτων ἀποβαίνοντα εἰς τὴν τύχην. ∆ιώνδας δὲ τοὐναντίον ἀξιοῖ γενέσθαι· μὴ
∆ημοσθένην τῆς προαιρέσεως ἕνεκα ἐπαινεῖσθαι, ἀλλ’ ἐμὲ τῆς τύχης ἕνεκα εὐθύνας δοῦναι. Cf. Dem. 60.19–20,
18.192–94, 300.
23
Hyp. Against Diondas 145v/144r 8–17: ∆ιώνδας...κατηγορεῖ ὡς οὐκ ἴση ἡ συμμαχία ἐγένετο, καὶ ἡμεῖς
Θηβαίων διπλάσια συνεβαλόμεθα εἰς τὸν πόλεμον καὶ χρήματα καὶ ἵππους καὶ στρατιώτας. εἰς δὲ τὴν ἐν
Σαλαμῖνι ναυμαχίαν, ὦ ∆ιώνδα, ἑξήκοντα καὶ τριακοσίων οὐσῶν τῶν τριήρων τῶν Ἑλληνίδων, τούτων ἡ πόλις
ἡ ἡμετέρα διακόσιας καὶ εἴκοσι παρέσχεν καὶ τἀναλώματα εἰς ταύτας, αἱ δ’ ἄλλαι πόλεις σύμπασαι
τετταράκοντα καὶ ἑκατόν. Cf. Dem. 18.237–38.
24
He does briefly refer to several specific events immediately after the battle, but then only offers the vaguest
generalizing remarks on developments after 337: see Dem. 18.248–54, 270–71, 285–88, 299–300, 323.
25
Aesch. 3.133; Hyp. Against Diondas 176r/173v 25–27: καὶ νῦν γε, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, πολλοὶ Θηβαίων
ἀκροῶνται ἐν τῶι δικαστηρίωι σχολὴν ἄγοντες (<ὡ>ς οὐκ ἂν ἐβουλόμην).
26
Hyp. Against Diondas 175r/174v 21–25: ἔλεγε δὲ ἐν τῆι πρώην ἐκκλησίαι δεῖν ἡμᾶς τὴν Πάραλον πέμψαντας
ὡς Ἀλεξάνδρον μέμφεσθαι αὐτῶι, ὅτι ὑστάτοις ὑμιν ἐπέστειλεν περὶ τῶν τριήρων, ὅπως δηλονότι τὸ λοιπὸν
πρώτοις ἡμῖν ἐπιτάττηι ἕκαστα. On the date see now L. Horváth, ‘Dating Hyperides’ Against Diondas’, ZPE 166
(2008) 27–34, with the reply by P. J. Rhodes in this volume.
180 BICS-52 – 2009

outcome of the battle for Athens in the 330s set Hyperides’ speech apart from On the Crown.
While speeches such as On the Crown or Lycurgus’ Against Leocrates nostalgically look
back to the fight for Greek independence at the battle of Chaeronea, which is depicted as a
heroic sacrifice, in the speech Against Diondas Hyperides distinctively voices discontent with
the current realities of the League of Corinth. In this regard the speech looks forward to the
revolt against Macedon that eventually broke out in 323, when Hyperides was the leading
anti-Macedonian advocate in Athens. He was chosen to deliver the funeral oration at the end
of the first year’s campaign, and in the surviving speech he again pays unexpected attention to
current events. But another political speech survives from the period between the Against
Diondas and Hyperides’ Funeral Oration, the Demosthenic assembly speech On the treaty
with Alexander ([Demosthenes 17], Περὶ τῶν πρὸς Ἀλέξανδρον συνθῆκων), which
contributes to the rhetoric of revolt with its detailed record of Athenian complaints about
Alexander’s control of Greece in the 330s.
In that speech the orator fiercely denounces Alexander’s leadership of the League of
Corinth and calls for a revolt against Macedon. The speech was written for an assembly
debate and the speaker first accuses Alexander of violating several terms of the agreement
with the Greeks and then boldly calls upon the Athenians to declare war on the Macedonian
transgressors. 27 There were two appropriate occasions for such a debate in the 330s, the
revolt of Thebes in 335, and Agis’ insurrection in 331. A few of the orator’s specific protests
about recent events in the Aegean sea appear to support the later date, and modern consensus
assigns the speech to 331. 28 As for the authorship, although the speech survives as part of
the Demosthenic corpus (perhaps it was grouped with Demosthenes’ speeches because it is a
deliberative speech for the assembly), since antiquity critics have assigned the work to some
other contemporary rhetor, for a variety of reasons. A modern statistical analysis of the
speech’s prose rhythm has demonstrated that the speech stands far apart from undoubtedly
Demosthenic speeches in its overall rhythm, 29 while ancient critics denied Demosthenic
authorship on account of the speech’s phrasing.
In his introduction to the oration Libanius observes that the speech better fits the
character of Hyperides than Demosthenes, and in particular he notes that some of the
vocabulary more closely conforms to the style of Hyperides than to that of Demosthenes. 30
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, when discussing Demosthenes’ use of vocabulary, similarly
judges authenticity by this criterion, and he notes in passing that non-authentic speeches
such as speech 17 contain ‘disgusting, vulgar and crude phrasings’ (ἀηδεῖς καὶ φορτικαὶ καὶ

27
[Dem]. 17.30.
28
The orator complains that the Macedonians have expelled the tyrants of Antissa and Eresos ([Dem]. 17.7), and
that they have detained the Athenian grain fleet at Tenedos and demanded that Athens outfit a hundred triremes
(20). The current consensus for the date originates with A. Schaefer, Demosthenes und seine Zeit (2nd ed.,
Leipzig 1856–1858) 3.208–09.
29
D. F. McCabe, The prose-rhythm of Demosthenes (New York 1981) 160.
30
Lib. Arg. D. orat. 17: ὁ δὲ λόγος ψευδεπίγραφος εἶναι δοκεῖ. οὐ γὰρ ἔοικε κατὰ τὴν ἰδέαν τοῖς ἄλλοις τοῖς τοῦ
∆ημοσθένους, ἀλλὰ τῶι Ὑπερίδου χαρακτῆρι μᾶλλον προσχωρεῖ τά τε ἄλλα καὶ λέξεις τινὰς ἔχει κατ’ ἐκεῖνον
μᾶλλον εἰρημένας ἢ τὸν ∆ημοσθένην, οἷον ‘νεόπλουτοι’ καὶ ‘βδελυρεύεσθαι’. Phot. Bibl. 491a (Henry
8.57.22-28) follows Libanius, noting the same vocabulary items. For discussion see C. Gibson, ‘The agenda of
Libanius’ Hypotheses to Demosthenes’, GRBS 40 (1999) 171–202, at 191–92 and 195–96.
 JUDSON HERRMAN: AGAINST DIONDAS – THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT 181

ἄγροικοι κατασκευαί) not found in genuine orations. 31 Libanius cites two rare formations,
the verb βδελυρεύομαι and the adjective νεόπλουτος, and a scholiast also refers to those two
words and adds a third coinage, the verb τυραννίζω. 32 There are other uncommon words in
the speech, for example the verb ἐπικρύπτω and the adverb ἀνεγκλήτως, which is used three
times in the speech in the sense ‘indisputable’, and occurs nowhere else in surviving Attic
oratory, 33 and perhaps the presence of these unusual words and phrases can be linked with
Hyperides’ well-known penchant for eclectic vocabulary. He was frequently identified by
later Greek scholars for his word choice, and the surviving speeches and fragments offer
numerous examples of phrasing that seems much closer to comedy or the koinē than
anything found in Demosthenes or the other orators. 34
The accumulated weight of both these ancient observations regarding the word usage and
style of [Demosthenes] 17 and modern statistical analysis of the speech’s prosody serves as
a compelling argument against Demosthenic authorship. Still, it is difficult to prove
Hyperidean authorship conclusively, and this reader would admit that the speech seems
rather lackluster and devoid of typical Hyperidean flourishes and panache. On the other
hand, Libanius knew more Attic oratory than we do today and had a firmer basis of
judgement, and the ancient biography of Hyperides reports that his deliberative oratory was
less colorful than his court speeches. 35 For this discussion of rhetorical opposition to
Macedon, it will suffice to observe that, whether the speech was composed by Hyperides or
some contemporary political ally, the overall tone and the content of the speech, with its
complaints about the Macedonian administration of the League of Corinth, are paralleled in
the brief references to recent events in the new Hyperides fragment Against Diondas, and
that these complaints are unlike what we find in the contemporary speeches of Lycurgus and
Demosthenes. If the speech does indeed come from a debate on Agis’ revolt, it outlines a
more extreme position than that taken by Demosthenes, who seems, as far as we can judge
from Aeschines’ mockery of his conduct at the time, to have initially supported Agis’ revolt,
but then failed to commit. 36 The call for revolt in [Demosthenes] 17 seems to better suit the
policy of the most zealous anti-Macedonian politicians of the period: Hyperides, who would
later assume a prominent role against Macedon during the Lamian War, or perhaps even
Lycurgus himself, who seems to have been actively raising money for Agis’ cause, judging
from his decree of 329 praising Eudemus of Plataea for recent war contributions. 37

31
D. H. Dem. 57.
32
Schol. ad Dem. 17.2 (Dilts 1.195).
33
F. Blass, Die attische Beredsamkeit (2nd ed., Leipzig 1887–1893) 3.2.149–50, discusses other undemosthenic
phrases in the speech.
34
Many of the fragments of Hyperides consist of single words quoted by lexicographers that are not found
elsewhere in Attic oratory (e.g., ζυγομαχέω [fr. 245] and ὀψαρτυτής [fr. 259]). The fragments of Demosthenes
(most conveniently consulted in R. Clavaud, Démosthène: lettres et fragments [Paris 1987] 127–48), in contrast,
do not include such items. U. Pohle, Die Sprache des Redners Hypereides in ihren Beziehungen zur Koine
(Leipzig 1928) 33–85, compiles lists of words used by Hyperides that do not appear elsewhere in oratory.
35
[Plut]. Vit. X or. 850b, where the verb δημηγορέω must refer to assembly speeches, although the audience are
described as δικασταί. Cf. D. Whitehead, Hypereides. The forensic speeches (Oxford 2000) 7 n. 26.
36
Aesch. 3.165–67.
37
P. J. Rhodes, A history of the classical Greek world, 478–323 BC (Malden 2006) 342, interprets IG II2 351
thus.
182 BICS-52 – 2009

As further evidence connecting [Demosthenes] 17 and the speech Against Diondas, a

specific verbal echo between the two speeches corroborates Libanius’ attribution of the
former speech to Hyperides. At the conclusion of On the treaty with Alexander the orator
complains that Athens must now ‘shamefully follow the lead of others’ (αἰσχρῶς ἑτέροις
ἀκολουθεῖν), and now in the Against Diondas, Hyperides also appears to use the phrase
ἑτέροις ἀκολουθεῖν in the context of a contemptuous characterization of Diondas’ support
for Athenian contributions to Alexander’s Persian campaign. 38 The phrase ἑτέροις
ἀκολουθεῖν occurs in only one other instance in the orators, when Isocrates declares that
Athens, because of its leadership during the Persian Wars, should not be forced to take a
subordinate role in a campaign against Persia. 39 The consistent use of the phrase to
describe Athens’ status as a participant in a panhellenic campaign against Persia confirms
the link in tone, if not authorship, between the Against Diondas and [Demosthenes] 17. 40
The rhetoric of revolt quiets in the early 320s, until its final remergence in Hyperides’
Funeral Oration, delivered in 322 during the Lamian War. As noted above, complaints
about the limitations imposed on Athens by Alexander and the League of Corinth are not
to be found in Demosthenes’ speech On the Crown, and that speech was Demosthenes’
swan song, despite his continued presence in Athens until 323. After the trial of Ctesiphon
in 330 there is almost (cf. n. 44, below) no visible sign of active opposition to Macedon,
and relatively little is known of the careers of the leading Athenian opponents of Macedon
until Harpalus arrives on the scene in 324. The surviving prosecution speeches against
Demosthenes in 323 reveal that he proposed various citizenship decrees during the period
after Ctesiphon’s trial, and he was also a synēgoros to Lycurgus in the prosecution of
Aristogiton. 41 As for Hyperides, there are a few tiny fragment of a defense speech of
Chaerephilus, 42 and his prosecution of Euxenippus in an eisangelia survives, as does the
logographic speech Against Athenogenes, both of which are to be dated to the period
between 330 and 324. 43 None of these speeches is concerned with the Macedonian
question, which must have seemed settled until the situation changed in 324, the year
when Alexander announced his Exiles Decree, Harpalus arrived in Athens, and the
Athenian assembly debated divine honors for Alexander and cultic worship for
Hephaestion. 44 The scandal surrounding Harpalus would eventually drive Demosthenes

38
[Dem.] 17.30 and Hyp. Against Diondas 176r/173v 1; the manuscript is extremely difficult to read here, but
this reading well suits the visible traces and makes excellent sense in context, as Hyperides turns from a
discussion of Athenian contributions to the Greek cause during the Persian Wars (145v/144r 12–31) to its
obligations as a member of the League of Corinth (145v/144r 32ff., with δὲ νῦν marking the transition).
39
Isoc. 4.99.
40
For other possible verbal links between Hyperides and [Demosthenes] 17, see Whitehead, Hypereides (n. 35,
above) 89, 218, 257, 258.
41
For the testimonia, see M. H. Hansen, The Athenian ecclesia II (Odense 1989) 41–43.
42
Frr. 181–91, and P.Oxy. 2686, on which see Whitehead, Hypereides (n. 35, above) 475–76.
43
On the date of the speeches against Euxenippus and Athenogenes, see Whitehead, Hypereides (n. 35, above)
155–57 and 266–67.
44
However, Hyperides is reported to have spoken in support of maintaining Chares’ mercenary forces at
Taenarum, probably in the early 320s ([Plut]. Vit. X or. 848e), and that activity would reinforce the fact that he
was looking for an opportunity for revolt well before 323. On Hyperides’ activities in the early 320s see the
testimonia listed by Hansen, The Athenian ecclesia (n. 41, above) 60, with the extensive discussion of J. Engels,
 JUDSON HERRMAN: AGAINST DIONDAS – THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT 183

into exile, and leave Hyperides as the leading Athenian advocate of rebellion when war
against Macedon erupted at the time of Alexander’s death in 323. Hyperides and the
general Leosthenes forged a coalition of Greek states to fight for freedom from
Macedonian control, 45 and this is the context for Hyperides’ most famous speech of
protest against the Macedonian hegemony, the Funeral Oration, which was delivered in
early 322, at the end of the first season of the war.
The complaints expressed by Hyperides in the Against Diondas about the Athenian
situation in the 330s anticipate the position taken by the speaker of [Demosthenes] 17,
who may have been Hyperides himself, and Hyperides’ Funeral Oration further develops
the rhetoric of revolt. In a departure from typical practice in epitaphioi logoi, Hyperides
offers no narrative of past Athenian accomplishments, and instead focuses exclusively on
the campaign season of 323/322, praising the general and the allies by name. 46 This
pointed topical content is unexpected in a state funeral oration, and Hyperides highlights
his novel approach by using language typically reserved for the Persian Wars to describe
the current campaign. 47 He presents a vivid description of the current state of affairs for
Athens and the Greeks, which echoes the account in [Demosthenes] 17. The latter speech
focuses on the terms of the League of Corinth and the speaker quotes the language of the
agreement when he calls upon the Greeks to fight to be ‘free and autonomous’ (τὸ
αὐτονόμους εἶναι καὶ ἐλευθέρους). 48 Similarly, in the Funeral Oration Hyperides objects
to the lack of external freedom and internal autonomy under the League of Corinth. He
constantly refers to ‘the freedom of the Greeks’ as the goal of the current campaign, 49 and
in one passage he singles out the concept of autonomia, the right to self-rule, and links it
to freedom and the rule of law as the key to human happiness. 50 This focused attention on
the current status of Athens links the Funeral Oration to [Demosthenes] 17, and is now
anticipated in the Against Diondas.
There are also broader links of content and tone between [Demosthenes] 17 and
Hyperides’ Funeral Oration. The former speech asks the Athenians what sort of
compulsion they find most hateful, and asserts that it is slavery to tyrants, such as the
Pisistratidae, because tyrants kill their subjects and assault their wives and children, 51 and
in the Funeral Oration Hyperides applies the same characterization of tyrants to the

Studien zur politischen Biographie des Hypereides: Athen in der Epoche der lykurgischen Reformen und des
makedonischen Universalreiches (Munich 1989) 210–46. For a summary of the events of 324 as precursors to
the outbreak of the Lamian War see J. Herrman, Hyperides: Funeral Oration (New York and Oxford 2009)
9-12.
45
On Hyperides’ leadership see Plut. Phoc. 23.2, Mor. 486d.
46
Hyp. Epit. 11–18. For examples of typical accounts of Athenian achievements see Lys. 2.3–66 and Pl. Mx.
239a–246b, with the analysis of the tradition by R. Thomas, Oral tradition and written record in classical
Athens (Cambridge 1989) 196–236.
47
For details, see J. Herrman, Hyperides: Funeral Oration (n. 44, above) 23.
48
[Dem]. 17.8. The phrase is formulaic and appears regularly in alliance decrees, e.g., IG II2 34.20–21 (Athens
and Chios, 384/383) and IG II2 43.10 and 20 (the second Athenian league, 378/377).
49
E.g., Hyp. Epit. 11, 16, 24.
50
Hyp. Epit. 25.
51
[Dem]. 17.3.
184 BICS-52 – 2009

Macedonians. He imagines what the world will be like if they continue to rule the Greeks,
and, reasoning from the current compulsions forced upon the Athenians, he predicts that
the Macedonians will inflict ceaseless hybris on Athenian women and girls, and on boys
too. 52 These sort of allegations regularly occur in descriptions of tyrants (cf. Hdt. 3.80.5),
but here both accounts are linked by the specific context of protest of Athenian
subordination to Macedon during the period after the battle of Chaeronea. By painting
Alexander as a tyrant and offering dire predictions for the future, both speeches present a
consistent view of contemporary events and call for revolt against Macedon.
The speech Against Diondas does not call for revolt, but it does highlight the current
Athenian situation, and in doing so it looks forward to later debates in a way that On the
Crown does not. The three speeches under consideration – Against Diondas, [Demosthenes]
17, and the Funeral Oration – are not engaged in a direct dialogue with each other; each
speech reflects particular aspects of the various different historical contexts. But when
considered as a group, these speeches evince a consistent broad position of opposition to
Macedon, and one that can be distinguished from Demosthenes’ retiring stance. Each speech
has its own particular context and flavor, and Aristotle’s classification of speeches into three
types – forensic cases for the courts, deliberative speeches for the assembly, and epideictic
speeches for ceremonial occasions – helpfully differentiates the three. 53 Aristotle
distinguishes these three types of speeches according to the time period they address: 54 court
speeches examine the past, and so in the Against Diondas we see a primary focus on the
period prior to the battle of Chaeronea, which the orator highlights by briefly drawing
connections to more recent events; assembly speeches look to the future, and so the speaker
of [Demosthenes] 17 calls upon the Greeks to initiate a new fight for their freedom and
autonomy; epideictic speeches consider the present state of affairs, and thus in the Funeral
Oration Hyperides describes the Greeks’ struggle for independence from Macedon as it
unfolds. Aristotle also classifies speeches according to speaker, listener, and subject, 55 and
in these three speeches there is a large overlap in the speaker, who may be Hyperides in all
three cases, and audience, who consisted of some portion of the Athenian demos in each
case. But the subject is different in each, and in each speech the primary emphasis is
correspondingly different. But at the same time a common thread, namely an explicit interest
in current affairs, ties together these different expressions of Athenian attitudes toward the
League of Corinth in 334, 331 and 322.
In conclusion, Porphyry invites us to compare Demosthenes’ On the Crown and
Hyperides’ Against Diondas, and in doing so a close correspondence between the two
speeches emerges, but also a significant difference. On the one hand Demosthenes resolutely
avoids discussion of events after 338, while on the other hand Hyperides describes in detail
numerous factional attacks on leading politicians in the Athenian courts after Chaeronea, he
surprisingly points to the exiled Thebans in the courtroom, and he complains about the
restrictions to Athenian freedom under Alexander. The legal issue is the same in both trials,
specifically whether Demosthenes should be praised for his service to Athens in the period

52
Hyp. Epit. 20–21.
53
Arist. Rh. 1358a36–1358b13 (1.3.1–3).
54
Arist. Rh. 1358b13–20 (1.3.4).
55
Arist. Rh. 1358a36–1358b2 (1.3.1).
 JUDSON HERRMAN: AGAINST DIONDAS – THE RHETORIC OF REVOLT 185

leading up to the final battle with Philip, but several factors may explain the different
rhetorical tactics. Perhaps in the defense speeches for these two trials – that of Hyperides in
334, and that of Demosthenes on behalf of Ctesiphon in 330 – Demosthenes simply has
stricter standards of relevance than Hyperides and avoids this later period because it is not
germane to the legal issue. Or perhaps this difference in rhetorical approach reflects
differences in policy or influence. By the late 330s Hyperides emerges as a more extreme
opponent to Macedon, and thus, for example, when Agis’ revolt broke out, Hyperides and
Lycurgus seem to have favored joining the rebellion, when Demosthenes, despite initial
support, eventually demurred. And when the Athenians finally did go to war in 323,
Hyperides was a more prominent leader than Demosthenes, who was in exile as a result of
the Harpalus scandal. Another possible explanation for the difference between Hyperides’
rhetorical strategy in 334 and Demosthenes’ approach in 330 may be the changed military
situation. Aeschines’ prosecution of Ctesiphon came to trial not long after Agis and his
Greek supporters were defeated at Megalopolis, and after Alexander had thoroughly
conquered the Persians, and these recent developments may have influenced how
Demosthenes presented his case in 330. So, for example, Hyperides can cleverly refer to
Thermopylae as an honorable Spartan defeat, 56 but such a topic would perhaps have been
too painful for Demosthenes to bring up in 330, shortly after the defeat of Agis.
In On the Crown Demosthenes presents himself as the ideal adviser of the demos, and
this rhetorical presentation best explains the different strategies in the two speeches. It serves
his purpose to ignore the negative outcomes of his policy, and to focus instead on the
moment in 338 when the Greeks banded together under his leadership. Hyperides, unlike
Demosthenes, does not have to account for his own personal career. Furthermore, he has
more at stake: he himself is on trial, unlike Demosthenes, who addresses the court in 330 as
a synēgoros, and his attention to the current Athenian situation is intended to impugn the
career of his adversary Diondas, whom he blames for all of Athens’ recent misfortune. For
this purpose his speech employs a new stratagem: it illuminates the aftermath of Chaeronea
in order to highlight what Athens had lost, and in doing so it anticipates the incipient fight to
regain freedom from Macedon. Hyperides lightens the heavy-handed patriotic rhetoric of On
the Crown, which had no use for the realities of Athens’ changed status under the League of
Corinth. Hyperides’ speech clearly shows support and sympathy for Demosthenes’ brand of
nostalgic patriotism, but it also displays traces of a new spirit of rebellion, one that would
culminate a decade later in the Lamian War. It has always been known that Hyperides was
an active proponent of revolt in the late 320s, when the Lamian War broke out, but now the
Against Diondas further shows that in the late 330s he took a more visible stance of
opposition to the current situation than did Demosthenes. 57

Department of Modern and Classical Languages, Allegheny College

56
Hyp. Against Diondas 176v/173r 11–15: ἀλλὰ σκέψασθε Λακεδαιμονίους ὅτι ἐν μὲν Κορίνθωι μαχόμενοι
ἐνίκων, ἐν Θερμοπύλαις δὲ πάντες ἀπώλοντο. ἀλλ’ ὅμως τῆς μὲν νίκης αὐτῶν οὐδεὶς λόγος, τὴν δ’ ἧτταν πάντες
ἐγκωμιάζουσιν.
57
Oral versions of this paper were delivered at the American Philological Association annual meeting and the Institute
of Classical Studies in January 2009. I am grateful to the audiences on both occasions for helpful feedback.