Lysias
Towards corollaries to Charara's Theses on the Function of Speech
Athens
Were they like us?
Sacred
Mythical
Virtuous
Glory
Ritual
Law
Logography
Charara's
Theses on
the Function
of Speech
- Character
- Action
- Democracy
- Accountable
- NonViolent
On the Death of Eratosthenes
Theses:1-3
1} Character
Ethopoeia
Oikos
2} Action
Contingency
Antithesis
Rhetoric
Contingent
"every city enacts its laws in order that when we are uncertain in a situation, we can go to them [the laws] to see what to do."
[35]
Antithesis
[29]
Fine v. Execution
You v. Eratosthenes
Injustice v. Law
It is not I who kill you, but the law of the city.
[26]
3} Democracy
#DemocracyProbs
Oligarchy
"this is the only crime for which both democracy and oligarchy give the same right of revenge..."
[2]
Fragments
- Role of Women
- Slaves
- Testimony of Slaves
- Adultery v. Rape
Concerning the Sekos
Theses: 3-5
And olives
Odyssey
Sitting at the base of the sacred olive,
The two plotted death for the insolent suitors.
[386]
Xenophon
The country produced everything one could want, except olives.
[6.6]
Oedipus @ Colonus
Growing wild,
Self-perpetuating,
Terrorizing all our enemies,
It thrives in our soil, eternal,
The nurturing, gray-green olive.
[696 - 701]
Aristotle
Athenian Constitution - 350 BCE
anybody who dug up or cut down a sacred olive-tree was tried by the Council of Areopagus, and if found guilty punished with death...
3} Democracy
The Thirty
4} Accountability
Eikos
"... is it more likely that my opponent is lying without any risk or that I did a thing like this in the face of great danger?"
[38]
5} NonViolence
Bia
"None of them has ever tried to harm me openly, but they send against me people like him - people you cannot rightly trust."
[40]
Corollaries
1} Character
Speech also actively creates character
2} Action
A} The contingent demands speech
B} How does speech act?
3} Democracy
The People + Speech = Dangerous
#DemocracyProbs
4} Accountability
Probability determines the extent of accountability.
5} NonViolence
But also becomes a form of violence
Lysias Towards corollaries to Charara's Theses on the Function of Speech