Antiphon's Tetralogies (I swear it's relevant to mafia)

[Marshmallow Marshall]

Through a long and tortuous path (following quotes in books...), I have stumbled across Antiphon's Tetralogies, of which this site seems to provide the most readable English version: https://www.sfu.ca/anewradermacher/x...tralogies.html

It's basically Mafia in ancient Greece. Each "tetralogy" is basically an accusation, a defense, a response to the defense, and a final defense, all in the context of a murder trial. I thought some mafia-inclined people could find it an interesting exercise.

[OzyWho]

Difficult to read. Too much so.
Has he made a single argument in any of these 3 cases? It all seems full of assertions.

Wiki says the dude wrote 15 of such tetralogies: 12 fictional for school and 3 for actual legal cases. I wonder if the 12 fictional speeches would be easier to read?

[Marshmallow Marshall]

Difficult to read. Too much so.
Has he made a single argument in any of these 3 cases? It all seems full of assertions.

Wiki says the dude wrote 15 of such tetralogies: 12 fictional for school and 3 for actual legal cases. I wonder if the 12 fictional speeches would be easier to read?

I will grant you that it is not exactly concise xD. However, I'm not sure what the opposition between arguments and assertions is meant to be. Aren't arguments series of logically connected assertions meant to prove a point (which is exactly what the texts are)?

As for fictional cases, I do not know. I have not delved that deep into the matter! :s

[OzyWho]

For me the difference is in how certain or provable are the premises and/or how certain is the conclusion.
Accusation for the first case be like:
"(7) Thirst for revenge made him forget the risk, and the overpowering fear of the ruin which threatened him spurred him to all the more reckless an attack. In taking this step he hoped not only that his guilt would remain undiscovered, but that he would also escape the lawsuit for embezzlement; nobody, he thought, would proceed with the suit, and judgement would go by default; [8] while in the event of his losing his case after all, he considered it better to have revenged himself for his defeat than, like a coward, to be ruined by the indictment without retaliating. And he knew very well that he would lose it, or he would not have thought the present trial the safer alternative." - If this was modern day trial, the defendants lawyer would just say: "objection, speculation" and it'd be stripped from records.

Meanwhile, defense be like: "I didn't do it because I risk more being sentenced guilty on murder than on embezzling" - very FM like, I admit.
I realize prosecutors from that time can't do more than speculate without eye witnesses, and there's no defense to speculation. - very FM like, I admit
Wait.. I'm starting to see a pattern here..

Btw, this quote is wild:

According to the prosecution, it is harder to believe that I was absent from the scene of the crime than that I was present at it. But I myself, by using not arguments from probability but facts, will prove that I was not present. All the slaves in my possession, male or female, I hand over to you for torture; and if you find that I was not at home in bed that night, or that I left the house, I agree that I am the murderer.

[Marshmallow Marshall]

I doubt this is a valid distinction: one can argue that the Earth is roughly spherical as much as one can argue that it is crepe-shaped... Of course, that doesn't mean both positions are equal, but my point is that argumentation is a mode of expression, and as such is not reliant on the nature of the discussed topic. I am going to dare and throw another Greek thing here https://demonax.info/doku.php?id=text...be_most_useful
This is clearly Plutarch arguing... for entirely vain stances that simply are an excuse to train eloquence, at this point.

And wow, that quote... I'm sure the guy's slaves won't be mad at all and wouldn't ever dare to say anything false, especially under torture! xD