Athenian Rowdies

The Athens of 350 BC was in many ways like our own society: bursting at the seams with idiots, drunkards and rabble ready to sue over anything. Like nearly every nation in the modern world, Athens had courts to try criminals and sue individuals for damages, both usually filled to capacity. In her magnificent work, The Murder of Herodes, Kathleen Freeman digs up old court transcripts and translates them for our enjoyment. Before we delve into our favorite testimonial, we will indulge ourselves with a little etymology. It turns out the word testimonial is derived from the same Greek root as testicle. Why? Only men were allowed to sue and testify in court, and so to prove their manhood and by extension their honor, they swore their testimony by grabbing their, well, manhood. More convenient than casting about for a Bible! It is interesting that this gesture is now interpreted as agressive or dismissive, when it was once the sacred symbol of one of our most ancient and important legal rights. But we digress. [Ancient Greece]

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