Greek Texts & Translations

46.6And surely, if he says that he believed this to be true because Phormio said it was, it would be like the same man to believe him when he said this, and to testify to it at his bidding. The laws, however, do not say this, but ordain that a man may testify to what he knows, or to matters at the doing of which he was present, and that his testimony must be committed to writing in order that it may not be possible to subtract anything from what is written, or to add anything to it. 46.7Hearsay evidence they do not admit from a living person, but only from one who is dead; but in the case of those who are sick or absent from the country they allow evidence to be introduced, provided it be in written form, and the absent witness and the one submitting his testimony shall alike be liable to action under the same impeachment, in order that, if the absent witness acknowledges his evidence, he may be liable to action for giving false testimony, and if he does not acknowledge it, the one who submitted his testimony may be liable. 46.8Now Stephanus here, without knowing that my father left a will or having ever been present when he drew one up, but having been told this by Phormio, has given hearsay evidence which is false, and has done it in defiance of the law.

To prove that I am telling the truth in this, the clerk shall read you the law itself.Law

It shall be lawful to introduce hearsay evidence from one that is dead, and written evidence given in absence from one who is out of the country, or is sick.

46.9Now I wish to prove to you that he has given evidence contrary to another law also, that you may know that Phormio, having no harbor of refuge from the grievous wrongs he has committed, had made a pretence of the challenge, but actually has given evidence for himself, screening himself behind the testimony of these men, by which the jurymen were deceived, assuming that they were testifying to the truth, and I was robbed of the property which my father left me and of reparation for the wrongs which I have suffered. For the laws do not permit a man to give evidence for himself either in criminal suits or in civil suits or in audits. Phormio, however, has given evidence for himself, when these men say that they have given this testimony on the strength of what they heard from him.

46.10But that you may be fully convinced of this, please read the law itself.Law

The two parties to a suit shall be compelled to answer one another's questions, but they may not testify.

Now consider this law also which ordains that action for false testimony may also be brought on this very ground, namely, that one testifies contrary to law.Law

The witness shall also be liable to action for giving false testimony on the mere ground that he gives evidence contrary to law, and the one producing him shall also be liable in the selfsame manner.

46.11Furthermore, even from the tablet upon which the deposition is written one can tell that he has given false evidence. For it is whitened, and was prepared at home. ^note Yet it is only those who testify to facts who should offer depositions prepared at home; those who testify to challenges, who stand forward on the spur of the moment, should present their depositions written in wax, in order that, if one wants to add or to erase anything, it may be easier to do so. 46.12In all these things, then, he is shown to have given false testimony, and to have given it contrary to law; but I wish to prove this further fact, that our father did not make a will, and could not legally make one. For, if anyone should ask you in accordance with what laws we should live as citizens, you would of course answer, the established laws. But look you, the laws ordain, “nor shall it be permitted to enact a law applying to an individual, unless the same law applies also to all the Athenians.” 46.13This law, then, ordains that we should live as citizens under the same laws and not one under one law, another under another. But my father died during the archonship of Dysnicetus, ^note and Phormio became an Athenian citizen during the archonship of Nicophemus, ^note in the tenth year after my father died. How, then, could my father, not knowing that Phormio was to become an Athenian citizen, have given him in marriage his own wife, and thus have outraged us, shown his contempt of the gift of citizenship which he had received from you, and disregarded your laws? And which was the more honorable course for him—to do this during his lifetime, supposing he wished to do it, or to leave behind him at his death a will which he had no legal right to make?