Oration Xxxil
Diogeiton
1. If the points in dispute, gentlemen of the jury, were not great, I should not have allowed these to come to you to court, believing it a disgrace to have differences with one’s relatives, and knowing that both such offenders seem to you to be all the worse, and those who cannot bear to be ill-treated by their relatives. But then, gentlemen of the jury, these have been defrauded of much money, and have suffered terribly at the hands of those for whom it was least proper, and they have appealed to me, their brother-in-law, and so I must speak in their behalf. 2. I married their sister, a granddaughter of Diogeiton, and having asked both of them many times, at first I persuaded them to entrust the case to friends, thinking it important that outsiders should not know of their affairs. But when Diogeiton could not bring himself to trust to any of his friends (to decide) about that which he had plainly been proved to hold, but preferred to defend suits, and to bring them if they were not brought (against him), and to run the greatest risks rather than by doing justice be rid of the charges in regard to them, (3) I beg of you, if I shall prove that they were treated under the guardianship of their grandfather worse than any one ever was in the city even by those not related, (I beg of you) to assist them to get justice, and if I do not prove it, trust him in everything, and believe me wrong here-after. I will try to tell you the whole story.
4. There were (two) brothers, gentlemen of the jury, Diodotus and Diogeiton, with the same father and mother, and they divided the ready money, and shared in the real estate. Now Diodotus made much money in business, and Diogeiton persuaded him to marry his only daughter, and they had two sons and a daughter. 5. Some time after this, Diodotus, having enlisted with Thrasyllus in the infantry, called his wife, who was his niece, and her father, who was his own father-in-law and son of the same father, the grandfather and uncle of his little ones, and thinking on account of these ties he could entrust his children to no one’s care more fittingly, he made a compact with him, and deposited with him five talents of silver. 6. And he showed lent out on bottomry seven talents and forty minae, and two thousand (drachmae) invested in the Chersonesus. And he provided in case of his death a talent to be given to his wife together with the household goods, and a talent to his daughter. And he left for his wife twenty minae and thirty Cyzicene staters. 7. After doing this, and leaving schedules at home, he went to join Thrasyllus.
And when he died in Ephesus, Diogeiton concealed his death from his daughter, and took the documents which he had left sealed, claiming that he must collect by these papers the money lent out on bottomry. 8. And when after a time he told them of his death, and they had performed the customary rites, for the first year they lived in Piraeus, for their store of provisions had been left there. But when these began to give out, he sent the sons up to the city, and married off their mother, giving her (as dowry) five thousand drachmae, a thousand less than her husband had appointed for her. 9. Eight years after this the elder of the boys passed his examination (became a citizen), and Diogeiton summoned them and said that their father had left them twenty silver minae and thirty staters. “So I have spent much of my own property for bringing you up. And as long as I had money, it made no difference to me; but now I myself am short of funds. So you, as you are of age and have become a citizen, are to look out to get your own living.” 10. After they heard this they were surprised, and went weeping to their mother, and taking her with them they came to me, feeling terribly bitter because of their trouble, and (really) miserably turned out of doors. With tears they called on me not to allow them to be cheated out of their inheritance and made paupers, cruelly treated by one who ought least of all (to have done it), but to aid them both for my wife’s sake and their own. 11. It were a long story to tell you the sorrow in my house during that time. Finally their mother begged and entreated, me to bring together her father and their friends, saying that, although formerly unaccustomed to speak before men, the magnitude of her misfortunes compelled her to declare to us all their miseries. 12. And in my indignation I went to Hegemon who had married the daughter of this (Diogeiton), and I went into the matter with other interested persons, and summoned him (Diogeiton) to an examination on what he had done. At first Diogeiton was unwilling, but at last was compelled by his friends. And when we had assembled, the woman asked him in what possible spirit (how he had the heart to) he had treated the boys so, “being (as you are) their father’s brother, my father, and both uncle and grandfather to them. 13. And if you feel no shame before men, you ought to fear the gods,” she said, “for when he sailed away you took five talents which he had deposited (with you). And for (the truth of) these things, I am willing to imprecate my children, both these and those I have had later, wherever you may please. Truly I am not so wretched nor think so much of money as to die having sworn falsely on my children, and take away unjustly the property of my father.” 14. Then she proved that he had received seven talents four thousand drachmae, and she showed the accounts of this. For in changing residence, when he moved from Collytus to the house of Phaedrus, the boys found an account-book which had been thrown away, and brought it to her. 15. This proved that he had received a hundred minae loaned out on interest on a mortgage, and two thousand drachmae, and valuable furniture; also there came in every year corn from the Chersonesus. “And then did you go so far,” she said, “with so much money in your possession, as to say that their father left (only) two thousand drachmae and thirty staters, the very amount which I inherited at his death and gave over to you? 16. And you even thrust out of their own house these grandsons of yours, thinly clad, barefooted, without an attendant, without beds, without cloaks, without the furniture their father had left them, without the deposit he entrusted to you. 17. And now you are supporting at great expense the children of my stepmother, happy children; and in this you do well, but you are wronging my children, whom you have driven from the house, and try to make out that they are poor instead of rich. And in such deeds you neither fear the gods, nor are ashamed before me, your daughter, who understand you, nor do you remember your brother, but care for your brother more than everything else.” 18. Then, gentlemen of the jury, as so many dreadful charges were made by this woman, all of us who were present were greatly affected by what he had done, and by her words, as we saw what the boys had suffered, and realized how unworthy a guardian of the property the dead had left. Then feeling how difficult it was to find a worthy person to entrust one’s affairs to, no one of those present, gentlemen of the jury, could speak, but went off in silence, weeping no less than the sufferers. So first let the witnesses come in.