Demosthenes was born in 384 B. C., the son of a wealthy Pandionis sword-maker also named Demosthenes. His mother was Kleoboule, whom a rival orator, Aeschines, claimed was a Scythian. The younger Demosthenes was orphaned at the age of seven and his legal guardians, Aphobus, Demophon, and Therippides, appropriated part of his inheritance.
When he was 18, he demanded that they tell him how they used his money. He found that they had stolen everything "except the house, and fourteen slaves and thirty silver minae" (30 minae = 1/2 talent). Two years later, in 364, he sued them for his missing inheritance (131/2 talents, or 3,000 lbs. of gold or $400,000). He delivered five orations, three Against Aphobus and two Against Ontenor. He received 10 talents.
He was noticed by the famous orator Callistratus and became a student of Isocrates, Plato, or possibly Aristotle, Theophrastus, and Xenocrates together. According to Plutarch, he employed Isaeus as his teacher in Rhetoric, although Isocrates was then teaching that subject.
His personal life was attacked by Aeschines, who claimed that he was a pederast who harmed boys, including Aristion, who spent some time in Demosthenes' house, and Cnosion, who was involved with Demosthenes' wife, a daughter of Heliodorus. Aeschines also claimed that Demosthenes incited Aristarchus, the son of Moschus, to murder Nicodemus of Aphidna, who had sued Demosthenes for desertion, and gouge out his eyes and tongue. According Aeschines, Demosthenes then stole Aristarchus' inheritance.
Demosthenes became a professional litigant and typographer, quickly gaining rich and powerful clients. Aeschines accused him of disclosing several of his clients' speeches to their opponents and causing them to loose their cases. Plutarch agreed with Aeschines, saying that Demosthenes "was thought to have acted dishonorably".
In 363, 359, and 357 B. C., Demosthenes became the trierarch, responsible for the fitting and maintainance of triremes. In 348 B. C. he became a choregos, paying for theatrical productions. He claimed to have never pleaded any private cases and entered the ecclesia (Athenian Assembly). He was derided for his style on several occasions because it "was cumbered with long sentences and tortured with formal arguments to a most harsh and disagreeable excess".
As a child he had had a speech impediment, which was "a perplexed and indistinct utterance and a shortness of breath, which, by breaking and disjointing his sentences much obscured the sense and meaning of what he spoke." He started improving his voice after entering politics, employing a regimen where he talked with pebbles in his mouth, recited while running, and talked on the seashore over the sound of the waves.
He started to participate in the Athenian democracy and wrote Against Androtion and Against Leptines from 355 - 354 B. C., attacking those who attempted to repeal certain tax exemptions. He wrote Against Timocrates and Against Aristocrates, calling for the elimination of corruption. He delivered his first political oration, On the Navy, in 354 B. C., calling for moderation and the reform of "symmories" (boards) as funding for the navy. From 352 - 351 B. C. he fought the powerful statesman Eubulus.
In 351 B. C. he began fighting Philip II of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great. He claimed that Philip was the worst enemy of Athens and criticized anyone who dismissed Philip as a nobody, warning that Philip was as dangerous as the Persians. He wrote a call for resistance called the First Philippic, stating that "for a free people there can be no greater compulsion than shame for their position." Until 341, all of his speeches would be anti-Philip.
When Philip attacked Olynthus, an ally of Athens, Demosthenes wrote the three Olynthiacs, criticizing his fellow Athenians as lazy and uncaring and condemning the war in Euboea. He was slapped during the Greater Dionysia by a rival called Meidias, who supported the war and Eubulus. Meidias had once attempted to break into Demosthenes' house to own it. In his Against Meidias, he called for the Athenians to rise up against Meidias, but later dropped his charges.
In 348, Philip conquered the Chalcidic federation, and Demosthenes called for compromise. Demosthenes, Aeschines, and Philocrates were sent as a peace delegation to Pella. They accepted the harsh terms Philip imposed but were forced to wait until after Philip finished his Thracian campaign. Philip conquered Phocis just after the treaty was signed, but the Athenians made no move. Macedon, supported by Thebes and Thessaly, took Phobis' place in the Amphictyonic Federation and Demosthenes recommended Philip's entrance into the Council of the League.
He travelled to the Peloponnese in 344 to free cities from Philip's control but ultimately failed. The Peloponnesians sent an envoy to Athens protesting his actions, in response to which he wrote the Second Philippic. The next year, when his rival Aeschines was being charged with high treason, he wrote On the False Assembly, but Aeschines barely was acquitted. Demosthenes wrote On the Chersonese and the Third Philippic calling for support of the rogue Athenian general Diopeithes, who was attacking Philip in Thrace.
Demosthenes went to Byzantium in 341 and not only convinced them to renew their alliance, but also convinced Abydos to ally with Athens as well. The Athenians denounced Philip and denounced the peace with Macedon, effectively declaring war. In 339 Philip accused the Amfissian Locrians of defiling sacred ground. Although Aeschines attempted to give Athens' support, the Athenians were convinced to abstain from voting by Demosthenes. The Amphictyonic Federation gave command of their army to Philip after failing to defeat the Locrians. Philip defeated the Locrians and quickly entered Phocis, seized Elateia, and restored the fortifications of the city. Athens entered into an alliance with Euboea, Megara, Achaea, Corinth, Acamania, and, thanks to Demosthenes' oration, Thebes.
Philip defeated Thebes and entered into another peace treaty with Athens. Demosthenes urged te fortification of Athens and delivered the Funeral Oration for the Athenians killed in Thebes. In 336, Philip was killed, and Alexander III took power. Demosthenes celebrated the death of Philip and took part in the rebellion. He sent envoys to opponents of Alexander, but Alexander quickly went to Thebes and Boeotia. Upon learning of this, the Athenians begged for mercy. In 335 rumors of Alexander's death spread, and Thebes and Athens again rebelled. Darius III of Persia funded them, and Demosthenes received 300 talents.
Alexander was not dead, but instead razed Thebes and attempted to force Athens to exile all anti-Macedonian orators. A special embassy led by Phocion, who was pro Macedonian, persuaded him to relent. Ctesiphon attempted to officially give Demosthenes a golden crown, but even though Demosthenes, in his On the Crown, defended Ctesiphon, not only did the proposal not go through, but Ctesiphon was prosecuted for legal irregularities.
In 324, Harpalus, to whom Alexander had given a large amount of money, absconded with it and fled to Athens. Demosthenes persecuted Harpalus and a committee was formed, headed by him, to deal with the funds upon Harpalus' imprisonment. Demosthenes was fined and imprisoned for missing sums after the escape of Harpalus, but escaped and was soon after acquitted. After the death of Alexander in 323, Demosthenes called for rebellion. Antipater, Alexander's successor, crushed all rebellion and demanded that the anti-Macedonian orators be handed to him. Demosthenes escaped to Calauria (now Poros), but was found by Antipater's confidant Archias. He committed suicide by sucking poison through a reed.
His last words were: "Now, as soon as you please you may commence the part of Creon in the tragedy, and cast out this body of mine unburied. But, O gracious Neptune, I, for my part, while I am yet alive, arise up and depart out of this sacred place; though Antipater and the Mac edonians have not left so much as the temple unpolluted."
