THE THIRD OLYNTHIAC
§ 4. two or three years ago (lit. 'this is the third or fourth year since). It was in November 352 B.C. If the present Speech was delivered before November 349, not quite three years would have elapsed. (The Greek words, [Greek: triton _he tetarton etos touti], must, on the analogy of the Speech against Meidias, § 13, against Stephanus, II. § 13, and against Aphobus, I. § 24, &c., mean 'two or three', not 'three or four years ago'). The vagueness of the expression is more likely to be due to the date of the Third Olynthiac being not far short of three years from that of the siege of Heraeon Teichos, than to the double-dating (on the one hand by actual lapse of time, and on the other by archon-years—from July to July—or by military campaigning seasons) which most commentators assume to be intended here, but which seems to me over-subtle and unlike Demosthenes.
that year: i.e. the archonship of Aristodemus, which ran from July 352 B.C. to July 351.
§ 5. the mysteries. These were celebrated from the 14th to the 27th of Boedromion (late in September).
Charidemus, of Oreus in Euboea, was a mercenary leader who had served many masters at different times—Athens, Olynthus, Cotys, and Cersobleptes—and had played most of them false at some time or other. But he was given the citizenship in 357 for the part which he had taken in effecting the cession of the Chersonese to Athens, and was a favourite with the people. He was sent on the occasion here referred to with ten ships, for which he was to find mercenary soldiers.
§ 6. with might … power. A quotation, probably from the text of the treaty of alliance between Athens and Olynthus.
§ 8. funds of the Phocians are exhausted. The Phocian leader Phalaecus had been using the temple-treasures of Delphi, but they were now exhausted.
§ 10. a Legislative Commission: i.e. a Special Commission on the model of the regular Commission which was appointed annually from the jurors for the year (if the Assembly so decreed), and before which those who wished to make or to oppose changes in the laws appeared, the proceedings taking the form of a prosecution and defence of the laws in question. The Assembly itself did not legislate, though it passed decrees, which had to be consistent with the existing laws. As regards legislation, it merely decided whether in any given year alterations in the laws should or should not be allowed.
§ 11. malingerers. The scholiast says that the choregi were persuaded to choose persons as members of their choruses, in order to enable them to escape military service, choreutae being legally exempted. Other exemptions also existed.
§ 12. persons who proposed them. This can only refer to Eubulus and his party.
§ 20. Corinthians and Megareans. From the pseudo-Demosthenic Speech on the Constitution ([Greek: _pe_ri suntaxe_os_]) and from Philochorus (quoted in the Scholia of Didymus upon that Speech) it appears that the Athenians had in 350 invaded Megara, under the general Ephialtes, and forced the Megareans to agree to a delimitation of certain land sacred to the two goddesses of Eleusis, which the Megareans had violated, perhaps for some years past (see Speech against Aristocrates, § 212). A scholiast also refers to the omission by Corinth to invite the Athenians to the Isthmian games, in consequence of which the Athenians sent an armed force to attend the games. Probably this was also a recent occurrence, and due to an understanding between Corinth and Megara.
§ 21. my own namesake: i.e. Demosthenes, who was a distinguished general during the Peloponnesian War, and perished in the Sicilian expedition.
§ 24. for forty-five years: i.e. between the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars, 476-431 B.C.
the king: i.e. Perdiccas II, who, however, took the side of Sparta shortly after the beginning of the Peloponnesian War. He died in 413. (The date of the beginning of his reign is unknown, but he did not become sole king of the whole of Macedonia until 436.)
§ 27. Spartans had been ruined: sc. by the battles of Leuctra (in 371) and Mantineia (in 362).
Thebans had their hands full, owing to the war with the Phocians, from 356 onwards.
§ 28. in the war, when Athens joined Thebes against Sparta (in 378). 'The allies' are those members of the Second Delian League (formed in 378) who had been lost in the Social War which ended in or about 355, when Athens was at peace with Thebes and Sparta. (See Introduction, vol. i, p. 9.)
§ 31. procession at the Boedromia. The Boedromia was a festival held in September in honour of Apollo and Artemis Agrotera, Probably a procession was not a regular part of the festival at this time. The importance which the populace attached to such processions is illustrated by the Speech against Timocrates, § 161.
§ 34. is it then paid service, &c.: almost, 'do you then suggest that we should earn our money?'
§ 35. adding or subtracting: sc. from the sums dispensed by the State to the citizens.
somebody's mercenaries. The reference is probably to the successes of Charidemus when first sent (see Introd. to Olynthiacs).