Note 47 — Chapter LXXVI · FROM THE PEACE OF ANTALKIDAS DOWN TO THE SUBJUGATION OF OLYNTHUS BY SPARTA.
Reading edition
Isokrates, l. c. παιδοποιεῖσθαι δὲ τοὺς πλείστους αὐτῶν γυναῖκας λαμβάνοντες παρ’ ἡμῶν, etc.
For the extreme distress of Athenian women during these trying times consult the statement in Xenophon, Memorab. ii, 7, 2-4.
The Athenian Andokides is accused of having carried out a young woman of citizen family,—his own cousin, and daughter of an Athenian named Aristeides,—to Cyprus, and there to have sold her to the despot of Kitium for a cargo of wheat. But being threatened with prosecution for this act before the Athenian Dikastery, he stole her away again and brought her back to Athens; in which act, however, he was detected by the prince, and punished with imprisonment from which he had the good fortune to escape. (Plutarch, Vit. X, Orat. p. 834; Photius, Cod. 261; Tzetzes, Chiliad. vi, 367).
How much there may be of truth in this accusation, we have no means of determining. But it illustrates the way in which the Athenian maidens, who had no dowry at home, were provided for by their relatives elsewhere. Probably Andokides took this young woman out, under the engagement to find a Grecian husband for her in Cyprus. Instead of doing this, he sold her for his own profit to the harem of the prince; or at least, is accused of having so sold her.