Callistratus Against Olympiodorus, an Action for Damages (51-55)

Androcleides is present here; for I gave him notice to come and bring the articles of agreement. I consent, men of the jury, that they be opened during the defendant’s speech, in either his first or his second, it makes no difference to me. But I wish you to hear the agreement and the oaths which Olympiodorus the defendant and I swore to one another. If he consents, let this be done, and do you hear for yourselves the articles when he shall see fit; and if he refuses to take this course, will it not be plain without further proof, men of the jury, that he is the most shameless of humankind, and that you may rightly refuse to accept as true anything whatever that he says?

But why am I so earnest in urging this? The defendant himself knows well that he has sinned against me and sinned against the gods in whose name he swore, and that he is a perjurer. But something has deranged him, men of the jury, and he is not in his senses. I am pained and I feel shame, men of the jury, at what I am about to tell you, but I am forced to tell it, in order that you, in whose hands the verdict lies, may hear all the facts before you reach the conclusion regarding us which may seem to you best.

For my mentioning the things which I am about to tell you this fellow is himself to blame, since he refused to settle our differences among our relatives, but chose to brazen the matter out. For you must know, men of the jury, that this fellow Olympiodorus has never married an Athenian woman in accordance with your laws; he has no children nor has ever had any, but he keeps in his house a mistress whose freedom he had purchased, and it is she who is the ruin of us all and who drives the man on to a higher pitch of madness.

Is it not indeed a proof of his madness that he refuses to do anything whatever that was stipulated in the agreement which was entered into with his full consent and with my own, and which was confirmed by an oath?—especially when I am striving, not in my own interest only, but in the interest of her to whom I am married, his own sister, born of the same father and the same mother, and in the interest of his niece, my daughter. For they are being wronged not less than I, but even more.

Can anyone, indeed, say that they are not wronged and are not suffering outrageous treatment, when they see this fellow’s mistress, in defiance of all decency, decked out with masses of jewels and with fine raiment, going abroad in splendid state and flaunting the luxury purchased with what is ours, while they are themselves too poor to enjoy such things? Are they not suffering a wrong even greater than my own? And in adopting such a manner of life is not Olympiodorus not manifestly mad and beside himself?

Now, that he may not claim, men of the jury, that I am speaking thus with a view to slandering him because of this suit, the clerk shall read you a deposition from his relatives and mine.

The Deposition