BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter Six
penalty in a euthyna not as a fixed amount, but as a variable amount equal to ten times
the dōra received. 33 This discrepancy can be explained if we posit that, as monetary fines
shifted from being laid down in an ad hoc manner, as in the Clinias and Assessment
decrees, to being more regular, the amount of the penalty also became standardized as a
tenfold fine.
Such standardization may have arisen through the regularity of procedure
characteristic of euthynai at the end of the fifth century; in other words, formal changes in
the euthyna process may have led to the fixed penalty of a tenfold fine for dōrodokia. 34
Like the ad hoc use of monetary penalties for dōra suits, even after Ephialtes’ reforms, an
official underwent a euthyna only if a formal indictment had been lodged against him,
whether by a willing citizen or by a euthynos. 35 By the turn of the century, however, all
magistrates had to undergo a euthyna, whether or not they had been suspected of any
owed 100 mnae from his euthyna (FGrH 324 F8), but it is unknown for what reason he was fined: cf.
Jacoby ad loc.
33 When later sources indicate a monetary penalty for dōrodokia, they seem to refer to a euthyna process, in
which a tenfold fine was used exclusively for the charges of dōrodokia and, crucially, embezzlement
(klopē): AP 54.2; Din. 1.60, Hyp. 5.24 with MacDowell (1990: 337 ad Dem. 21.113). Din. 2.16 and Hyp.
5.24 juxtapose a tenfold fine for bribery and a simple fine for other a)dikh/mata; Din. 1.60 erroneously calls
the simple fine a twofold fine but likewise singles out the punishment for bribery as a tenfold fine or death.
Two clues indicate that this juxtaposition signaled a euthyna in particular. First, all three sources mention
a)dikh/mata, which might refer to the obscure a)diki/ou for which logistai could convict an official and
punish him with a simple fine (AP 54.2); indeed, juxtaposing the penalty for dōrodokia with other ‘crimes’
makes little sense outside the context of other crimes prosecuted at a euthyna. Second, that these
a)dikh/mata refer to the logistai is itself clear from Dinarchus’ calling them “the other crimes concerning
the lo/goj of money” (Din. 1.60). My view is not affected by the fact that Hyperides distinguishes
between dōrodokia by private individuals and that by public officials; this distinction need not imply that
his subsequent contrast of punishments is for the same two categories. As I read the passage, he merely
sets up two different contrasts (private individuals/public individuals; dōrodokia/other crimes at a euthyna),
albeit confusingly, by using the same verb (a)dike/w).
34 Dinarchus 2.16 writes that the “first lawgivers” (prw=toi nomoqe/tai) created a tenfold fine when the
graphē dōrōn was first created. As noted above, the phrase is a hapax, so it is likely that Dinarchus refers
here to two different phases in the history of the graphē dōrōn: creation by the ‘first lawgiver’ (Solon), and
creation of a tenfold fine by the ‘first lawgivers’ (i.e. the first nomothetai in 403/2 or perhaps in 399 with
the completion of the codification of the laws).
35 Note how in public inscriptions the verb eu)qu/nesqai (‘to undergo a euthyna’, lit. ‘to correct’) continued
to imply some kind of accusation until the end of the fifth century. Only in the beginning of the fourth
century did it cease to be used this way: Piérart (1971: 548-9, 558).
269