Τοῦ δέ τ᾽ ἐρητύεται κραδίη καὶ θύμος ἀγήνωρ,
Ποινὴν δεξαμένου....
The ποινὴ is, in its primitive sense, a genuine payment in valuable commodities serving as compensation (Iliad, iii. 290; v. 266; xiii. 659): but it comes by a natural metaphor to signify the death of one or more Trojans, as a satisfaction for that of a Greek warrior who had just fallen (or vice versâ, Iliad, xiv. 483; xvi. 398); sometimes even the notion of compensation generally (xvii. 207). In the representation on the shield of Achilles, the genuine proceeding about ποινὴ clearly appears: the question there tried is, whether the payment stipulated as satisfaction for a person slain, has really been made or not,—δύο δ᾽ ἄνδρες ἐνείκεον εἵνεκα ποινῆς Ἀνδρὸς ἀποφθιμένου, etc. (xviii. 498.)
The danger of an act of homicide is proportioned to the number and power of the surviving relatives of the slain; but even a small number is sufficient to necessitate flight (Odyss. xxiii. 120): on the other hand, a large body of relatives was the grand source of encouragement to an insolent criminal (Odyss. xviii. 141).
An old law of Tralles in Lydia, enjoining a nominal ποινὴ of a medimnus of beans to the relatives of a murdered person belonging to a contemptible class of citizens, is noticed by Plutarch, Quæst. Græc. c. 46, p. 302. Even in the century preceding Herodotus, too, the Delphians gave a ποινὴ as satisfaction for the murder of the fabulist Æsop; which ποινὴ was claimed and received by the grandson of Æsop’s master (Herodot. ii. 134. Plutarch. Ser. Num. Vind. p. 556).
[159] See Lysias, De Cæde Eratosthen. Orat. i. p. 94; Plutarch. Solon, c. 23; Demosthen. cont. Aristokrat. pp. 632-637.
Plato (De Legg. ix. pp. 871-874), in his copious penal suggestions to deal with homicide, both intentional and accidental, concurs in general with the old Attic law (see Matthiæ, Miscellanea Philologica, vol. i. p. 151): and as he states with sufficient distinctness the grounds of his propositions, we see how completely the idea of a right to private or family revenge is absent from his mind. In one particular case, he confers upon kinsmen the privilege of avenging their murdered relative (p. 871); but generally, he rather seeks to enforce upon them strictly the duty of bringing the suspected murderer to trial before the court. By the Attic law, it was only the kinsmen of the deceased who had the right of prosecuting for murder,—or the master, if the deceased was an οἰκέτης (Demosthen. cont. Euerg. et Mnesibul. c. 18); they might by forgiveness shorten the term of banishment for the unintentional murderer (Demosth. cont. Makart. p. 1069). They seem to have been regarded, generally speaking, as religiously obliged, but not legally compellable, to undertake this duty; compare Plato, Euthyphro, capp. 4 and 5.
[160] Lysias, cont. Agorat. Or. xiii. p. 137. Antiphon. Tetralog. i. 1, p. 629. Ἀσύμφορον δ᾽ ὑμῖν ἐστὶ τόνδε, μιαρὸν καὶ ἄναγνον ὄντα, εἰς τὰ τεμένη τῶν θεῶν εἰσιόντα μιαίνειν τὴν ἅγνειαν αὐτῶν, ἐπὶ δὲ τὰς αὐτὰς τραπέζας ἰόντα συγκαταπιμπλάναι τοὺς ἀναιτίους· ἐκ γὰρ τούτωον αἵ τε ἀφορίαι γίνονται, δυστυχεῖς θ᾽ αἱ πράξεις καθίστανται.
The three Tetralogies of Antipho are all very instructive respecting the legal procedure in cases of alleged homicide: as also the Oration De Cæde Herodis (see capp. 1 and 2)—τοῦ νόμου κειμένου, τὸν ἀποκτείναντα ἀνταποθανεῖν, etc.
The case of the Spartan Drakontius, one of the Ten Thousand Greeks who served with Cyrus the younger, and permanently exiled from his country in consequence of an involuntary murder committed during his boyhood, presents a pretty exact parallel to the fatal quarrel of Patroklus at dice, when a boy, with the son of Amphidamas, in consequence of which he was forced to seek shelter under the roof of Pêleus (compare Iliad, xxiii. 85, with Xenoph. Anabas. iv. 8, 25).