Trierarchy

Well, then, that he consented and extended the time of payment has been established for you by witnesses, and that I was serving as trierarch my colleague in the trierarchy has testified, and also that the ship was equipped as flagship for the admiral Alcimachus.

For of course you are aware that no one is exempt from the equipment of war-galleys or from the special contributions for war.

For from special contributions for war or for national defence and also from the equipment of war-galleys, rightly and justly in accordance with earlier laws, no one is exempt, not even the descendants of Harmodius and Aristogiton, whom Leptines has specially named.

You see, Athenians, how explicitly the law lays down that none shall be exempt from the equipment of a war-galley except the nine archons.

whereas I served for my own term and that of my associate in the trierarchy, and when my term of service had expired and I was ordered by the general to sail to Hieron, I convoyed the grain for our people, that they might buy in a plentiful market, and that, so far as depended on me, there should be no lack;

Of these I was the first to pay my taxes in advance, nor did I seek to get myself excused either on the ground that I was serving as trierarch and could not defray the costs of two public services at once, or that the laws did not permit such a thing.

For Euctemon, the pentecontarch, after he was sent home from the Hellespont on account of his sickness, when he reached port and heard that Polycles had been appointed to relieve me, knowing that the term of my trierarchy had expired and that I was now serving over time, took with him my father-in-law, Deinias, and coming up to Polycles in the sample market, bade him set sail and take over the shi …

There was a time not long ago when the revenue of your state did not exceed a hundred and thirty talents, and yet of those competent to undertake the trierarchy or pay the property-tax there is not one that declined the duty that devolved on him in the absence of a surplus;

For they sought out the man who would take their trierarchy on the lowest terms, and have let the service to him.

For a man who serves as trierarch in the interest of Athens ought not to expect to grow rich at the public expense, but ought by means of his own resources to repair the losses of the state, if you are to have the service which you need.

For they are their own masters in all that they do, and they all but sell the public weal by the voice of the common crier;

Then when my career was near its close, having been challenged to an exchange of property on the question of a trierarchy, and subjected to a trial on that issue, I came to realize that even outside of my profession there were those who were not disposed towards me as I had thought;

for, although my opponent made no argument whatever on the merits of the case, and did nothing but decry my “cleverness” of speech and indulge in extravagant nonsense about my wealth and the number of my pupils, they imposed the trierarchy upon me.