The Greek orators

by J. F. Dobson

Hyperides, a member of a middle-class family, was born in 389 B.C., and so was almost exactly contemporary with Lycurgus, whose political views he shared. He too, according to his biographer, was a pupil of Isocrates and of Plato, but the influence of the latter can nowhere be traced in his work.

A man of easy morals and self-indulgent habits, he presents a striking contrast to the austerity of Lycurgus. The comic poets satirized his gluttony and his partiality for fish, and the Pseudo-Plutarch records that he took a walk through the fish-market every day of his life; but the pursuit of pleasure did not impair his activity.

He was at first a writer of speeches for others, as Demosthenes was at the beginning of his career;[434] but before he reached the age of thirty he began to be concerned personally in trials of political import. He prosecuted the general Autocles on a charge of treachery, in 360 B.C.; he appeared against the orator Aristophon of Azenia, and Diopeithes. He impeached in 343 B.C., Philocrates, who had brought about the peace with Philip.[435] He was sent as a delegate to the Amphictyonic Council,[436] and showed himself a vigorous supporter of the policy of Demosthenes; in 340 B.C., when an attack on Euboea by Philip was anticipated, he collected a fleet of forty triremes, two of which he provided at his own cost. Shortly before Chaeronea he proposed a decree to honour Demosthenes; after the battle he took extreme measures for the public safety, including the enfranchisement of metoeci and the manumission of slaves. He was prosecuted by Demades for moving an illegal decree, and retorted, ‘The arms of Macedon made it too dark to see the laws; it was not I who proposed the decree—but the battle of Chaeronea.’[437] He was able to retaliate soon afterwards by prosecuting Demades for the same offence of illegality. Demades had proposed to confer the title of proxenos on Euthycrates, who had betrayed Olynthus to Philip. A fragment which remains of Hyperides’ speech on this subject shows him to be a master of sarcasm.[438]

We know nothing for certain about the origin of the breach between him and Demosthenes; it may have been due to his disapproval of the latter’s policy of inactivity when Sparta in 330 B.C. wished to fight with Antipater; at any rate his language in 334 B.C. shows him to be an irreconcilable adversary of Macedon. Nicanor had sent a proclamation to the Greeks requesting them to recognize Alexander as a god, and to receive back their exiles. At the same time Harpalus, Alexander’s treasurer, had deserted from the king’s side and arrived at Athens with a considerable treasure. Demosthenes was in favour of negotiating with Alexander; Hyperides wished to reject the proposals of Nicanor, and use the treasure of Harpalus for continuing the war against Macedon. Harpalus was arrested, but succeeded in escaping, and many prominent statesmen came under suspicion of having received bribes from him. Hyperides was chosen as one of the prosecutors, and Demosthenes was exiled.

Hyperides, after Alexander’s death, took the chief responsibility for the Lamian war, and was chosen to pronounce the funeral oration on his friend, the general Leosthenes, and the other Athenians who fell in the war. Demosthenes had now returned from exile; the two patriots were reconciled, and persisted in the policy of resistance from which the prudence of Phocion had long striven to dissuade Athens. After the battle of Crannon, Antipater demanded the surrender of the leaders of the war party; Hyperides fled, was captured and put to death in 322 B.C. He is said to have bitten out his tongue for fear that he might, under torture, betray his friends. His body was left unburied till the piety of a kinsman recovered it and gave him interment in the family tomb by the Rider’s Gate. He had proved himself consistent throughout his public life, and however mistaken his policy, especially in the latter years, may have been, honour is due to him for the unflinching patriotism which led him to martyrdom in a vain struggle to uphold his country’s honour.

Until the middle of the nineteenth century, Hyperides was known to the modern world only from the criticisms of Dionysius and other ancient scholars, and from a few minute fragments preserved here and there by quotations in scholiasts and lexicographers. A manuscript is believed to have existed in the library at Buda, but when that city was captured by the Turks in 1526 the library was destroyed or dispersed, and Hyperides was lost.

In 1847 portions of his speeches began to reappear among the papyri discovered in Egypt. In that year a roll, containing fragments of the speech Against Demosthenes and of the first half of the Defence of Lycophron, was brought to England; a second roll discovered in the same year was found to contain the second half of the Lycophron and the whole of the Euxenippus. In 1856 were discovered considerable fragments of the Funeral Speech. In 1890, some fragments of the speech Against Philippides were acquired by the British Museum, while the most important discovery of all was that of the speech Against Athenogenes. The MS. was purchased for the Louvre in 1888, but the complete text was only published in 1892. Its importance may be estimated by the fact that Dionysius couples this speech and the defence of Phryne as being the best examples of a style in which Hyperides surpassed even Demosthenes. The papyrus itself is of interest as giving us one of the very earliest classical MSS. that we possess; it dates from the 2nd century B.C.[439]

In many points Hyperides challenges comparison with Lysias. The criticism of Dionysius is well worth our consideration: ‘Hyperides is sure of aim, but seldom exalts his subject; in the technique of diction he surpasses Lysias, in subtlety (of structure) he surpasses all. He keeps a firm hold throughout on the matter at issue, and clings close to the essential details. He is well equipped with intelligence, and is full of charm; he seems simple, but is no stranger to cleverness.’[440]

The first sentence contrasts Hyperides once for all with his contemporary Lycurgus, who, while less sure of his aim, has a personal dignity which gives exaltation to every theme.

We have hardly enough of the work of Hyperides to enable us to form a first-hand judgment as to the merits of his diction compared with that of Lysias. He has, indeed, the same simplicity and naturalness, but hardly, so far as we can judge, the same felicity of expression.