§§ 22, 23. The law does not allow any one to marry an ‘heiress,’ without a legal adjudication. Phormion made no legal claim for the hand of my mother, but did exactly as he pleased, in defiance of the law.
ἐπὶ τούτοις ‘next, after this,’ as in § 27 l. 1.
τῶν ἐπικλήρων The plaintiff attempts to prove that his mother was an ‘heiress.’ If so, her property ought to have passed absolutely into the hands of her eldest son, on his coming of age, whether her husband was alive or not. But there is not a single trace of such a relation between Archippe and Apollodorus in the rest of the speeches of the latter. Archippe was most probably of foreign extraction (cf. Or. 45 § 22） and the plaintiff's argument seems the merest shuffling. (See further, A. Schaefer, Dem. u.s. Zeit, III 2, 176.) On ἐπιδικασία τῶν ἐπικλήρων cf. Aristotle's Const. of Athens, 56 § 6 (among the duties of the Archon) κλήρων καὶ ἐπικλήρων ἐπιδικασίαι, and see note on Or. 45 § 75.
κληροῦν κλήρων κ.τ.λ. i e. ‘assign by lot days for the trial of claims to inheritances or heiresses.’ Below, we have the corresponding phrase λαχεῖν τῆς ἐπικλήρου, i.e. ‘to have allotted to one a suit for the hand of the heiress.’ Compare the common phrases λαγχάνειν and κληροῦν δίκην. So λαγχάνειν τοῦ κλῆρου ‘to be a suitor for the property,’ a phrase derived from λαγχάν ειν τὴν δίκην τοῦ κλήρου Isaeus Or. 11 (Hagn.) § 22, and Or. 3 (Pyri.) § 43 (with Wyse's note); Aristotle's Const. of Athens, 43 § 4 τὰς λήξεις τῶν κλήρων καὶ τῶν ἐπικλήρων. After κληροῦν Meier and Schomann, p. 807 Lips., understand δίκας.
τὸν ἄρχοντα The Archon Eponymus, or Chief Archon. See Or. 35 § 48 (where the duties of the Polemarch are also mentioned) and Or. 37 § 33.
πλὴν τοῦ σκιροφοριῶνος The last month of the official year, nearly corresponding to our June. It is here excepted, apparently because it was in this month that most of the magistrates vacated office and passed their audit.
άνεπίδικον ‘Without legal adjudication.’ See Hermann-Thalheim, Privatalt. p. 83, notes 5 and 8.
