Speakers Diffident and Speakers Brash in the Athenian Courts

Abstract In many of the surviving Athenian law court speeches, litigants and sunēgoroi claim that, as amateurs, they come to trial at a disadvantage. Occasionally, they acknowledge a reputation for wishing to advance themselves by a display of rhetorical abilities. Whatever stance the speaker takes, these maneuvers add to the complex texture of Attic oratory. We find a remarkable variety of approaches, e. g., Antiphon giving a Lesbian-speaking client an ornate acknowledgment in lightly Ionicized Attic of his rhetorical inadequacy; Lysias posing as a forensic novice when he represents himself; Dinarchus mimicking a speaker at a loss for words; Lycurgus warning the jury that the defendant will (mis)represent himself as an amateur under attack by a malicious prosecutor. And the orator who has, however falsely, spoken to his audience of his own sense of formidable rhetorical challenge might thereby be better prepared to improvise his response to his opponents’ speeches. Alcidamas, champion of improvisation, would be sympathetic.