Note 689 — Chapter XLVI · CONSTITUTIONAL AND JUDICIAL CHANGES AT ATHENS UNDER PERIKLES.

Demosthen. cont. Timokrat. c. 20, pp. 725, 726. Ἆρ’ οὖν τῷ δοκεῖ συμφέρειν τῇ πόλει τοιοῦτος νόμος, ὃς δικαστηρίου γνώσεως αὐτὸς κυριώτερος ἔσται, καὶ τὰς ὑπὸ τῶν ὀμωμοκότων γνώσεις τοῖς ἀνωμότοις προστάξει λύειν; Ἐνθυμεῖσθε, ἀπὸ τοῦ δικαστηρίου καὶ τῆς καταγνώσεως οἷ διεπήδησεν (Timokratês) ἐπὶ τὸν δῆμον, ἐκκλέπτων τὸν ἠδικηκότα! Compare Demosthen. cont. Eubulid. c. 15.

See, about the nomothetæ, Schömann, De Comitiis, ch. vii, p. 248, seqq., and Platner, Prozess und Klagen bey den Attikern, Abschn. ii, 3, 3, p. 33, seqq.

Both of them maintain, in my opinion erroneously, that the nomothetæ are an institution of Solon. Demosthenês, indeed, ascribes it to Solon (Schömann, p. 268): but this counts, in my view, for nothing, when I see that all the laws which he cites for governing the proceedings of the nomothetæ, bear unequivocal evidence of a time much later. Schömann admits this to a certain extent, and in reference to the style of these laws,—“Illorum quidem fragmentorum, quæ in Timokrateâ extant, recentiorem Solonis ætate formam atque orationem apertum est.” But it is not merely the style which proves them to be of post-Solonian date: it is the mention of post-Solonian institutions, such as the ten prytanies into which the year was divided, the ten statues of the eponymi,—all derived from the creation of the ten tribes by Kleisthenês. On the careless employment of the name of Solon by the orators, whenever they desire to make a strong impression on the dikasts, I have already remarked.