Euxitheus Against Eubulides, an Appeal (36-40)

Pray, men of Athens, do not scorn the needy (their poverty is misfortune enough), and scorn still less those who choose to engage in trade and get their living by honest means. No; listen to my words, and if I prove to you that my mother’s relatives are such as free-born people ought to be; that they deny upon oath the calumnious charges which this man makes regarding her, and testify that they know her to be of civic birth—they on their part being witnesses whom you yourselves will acknowledge to be worthy of credence—, then, as you are bound to do, cast your votes in my favor.

My grandfather, men of Athens, the father of my mother, was Damostratus of Melitê.[*] To him were born four children; by his first wife a daughter and a son Amytheon, and by his second wife Chaerestratê my mother and Timocrates. These also had children. Amytheon had a son Damostratus, who bore the same name as his grandfather, and two others, Callistratus and Dexitheus. Amytheon, my mother’s brother, was one of those who served in the campaign in Sicily[*] and were killed there, and he lies buried in the public tomb.[*] These facts will be proved to you by testimony.

To Amytheon’s sister, who married Diodorus of Halae,[*] was born a son Ctesibius, and he was killed in Abydus[*] while serving in the campaign with Thrasybulus. Of these relatives there is living Damostratus, son of Amytheon and nephew of my mother. The sister of my grandmother Chaerestratê was married to Apollodorus of Plotheia.[*] They had a son Olympichus, and Olympichus a son Apollodorus, who is still living.

(To the clerk.) Call these people, please.

The Witnesses

These witnesses, then, you have heard giving their testimony and taking their oaths. I will call also one who is our kinsman on both sides, and his sons. For Timocrates, who is my mother’s brother, born from the same father and the same mother, had a son Euxitheus, and Euxitheus had three sons. All these persons are still living.

(To the clerk.) Call, please, those of them who are in the city.

The Witnesses

Now take, please, the depositions of the members of the clan belonging to the same gens as my mother, and of the members of the deme, and of those who have the right of burial in the same tombs.

The Depositions

As to my mother’s lineage, then, I prove to you in this way that she was an Athenian on both the male and the female side. My mother, men of the jury, first married Protomachus, to whom she was given by Timocrates, her brother born of the same father and the same mother[*]; and she had by him a daughter. Then she married my father and gave birth to me. But how it was that she came to marry my father you must hear; for the charges which my opponent makes regarding Cleinias and my mother’s having served as nurse—all this too I will set forth to you clearly.