The Declamations of Polemon of Laodicea, the sophist of Smyrna who was active under Trajan and Hadrian, are two complete speeches in Attic Greek on a single theme from the battle of Marathon. An Athenian law is imagined to grant the funeral speech for the Marathon dead to the father of the man who fell most bravely, and the fathers of Cynegeirus and Callimachus contest the honour before the judges.
In the first speech Euphorion, father of Cynegeirus, sets his son's hand, lost seizing a Persian ship, against Callimachus, the polemarch whose body the arrows held upright, and calls on his other son Aeschylus to compose the funeral speech. In the second, Callimachus' father answers him: as polemarch Callimachus led the whole army and stood even in death, while Cynegeirus' grab at a ship was folly, since no single hand could hold a crewed ship.
Each speaker argues in character, in the form of declamation practised by the sophists whose careers Philostratus records in his Lives of the Sophists, where Polemon has a long life of his own. The two speeches are transmitted together in medieval manuscripts.
Polemon of Laodicea Declamations: summary and contents (PDF)
Polemon of Laodicea Declamations: summary and contents (Markdown)
Contents
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Αʹ Declamation 1 (Cynegeirus and Callimachus)
An Athenian law gives the funeral speech for the Marathon dead to the father of the man who died most bravely, and the fathers of Cynegeirus and Callimachus contest it. Here Cynegeirus' father speaks. He sets his son's hand, lost seizing a Persian ship, against Callimachus, the polemarch whose corpse the arrows held upright, and calls on his other son Aeschylus to compose the speech before laying his hands on the tomb.
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Βʹ Declamation 2 (Father of Callimachus)
Callimachus' father, answering Euphorion in the contest over the funeral speech for Marathon, claims the honour for his son. As polemarch Callimachus led the whole army, and in death the arrows held him standing. Cynegeirus' grab at a Persian ship is cast as reckless folly, since no single hand could hold a crewed ship. He closes by bidding Euphorion lament his own son afterwards, if the judges agree.