case, called anakrisis, by the king-archon, in order that it might be
known what was the issue, and where the sittings of the ephetæ were
to be held.
[130] Pausanias, ix, 36, 4. Δράκοντος Ἀθηναίοις θεσμοθετήσαντος
ἐκ τῶν ἐκείνου κατέστη νόμων οὓς ἔγραφεν ἐπὶ τῆς ἀρχῆς, ἄλλων
τε ὁπόσων ἄδειαν εἶναι χρή, καὶ δὴ καὶ τιμωρίας μοιχοῦ: compare
Dêmosthen. cont. Aristokrat. p. 637; Lysias de Cæde Eratosthen.
p. 31.
[131] Harpokration, vv. Ἐφέται, Ἐπὶ Δελφινίῳ, Ἐπὶ Παλλαδίῳ,
Ἐν Φρεαττοῖ; Pollux, viii, 119, 124, 125; Photius, v. Ἐφέται;
Hesychius, ἐς Φρέατου; Dêmosthen. cont. Aristokrat. c. 15-18, pp.
642-645; cont. Makartat. c. 13, p. 1068. When Pollux speaks of
the five courts in which the ephetæ judged, he probably includes
the areopagus (see Dêmosth. cont. Aristokrat. c. 14, p. 641).
About the judges ἐν Φρεαττοῖ, see Aristot. Polit. iv, 13, 2.
On the general subject of this ancient and obscure criminal
procedure, see Matthiæ, De Judiciis Atheniensium (in Miscellan.
Philologie, vol. i, p. 143, _seq._); also Schömann, Antiq. Jur.
Pub. Att. sect. 61, p. 288; Platner, Prozess und Klagen bey den
Attikern, b. i, ch. 1; and E. W. Weber, Comment. ad Dêmosthen.
cont. Aristokrat. pp. 627, 641; Meier und Schömann, Attisch.
Prozess, pp. 14-19.
I cannot consider the ephetæ as judges in appeal, and I agree
with those (Schömann, Antiq. Jur. Pub. Gr. p. 171; Meier und
Schömann, Attisch. Prozess, p. 16; Platner, Prozess und Klagen,
t. i, p. 18) who distrust the etymology which connects this word
with ἐφέσιμος. The active sense of the word, akin to ἐφίεμαι
(Æsch. Prom. 4) and ἐφετμὴ, meets the case better: see O. Müller,
Prolegg. ad Mythol. p. 424 (though there is no reason for
believing the ephetæ to be older than Drako): compare, however,
K. F. Hermann, Lehrbuch der Griechischen Staats Alterthümer,
sects. 103, 104, who thinks differently.
The trial, condemnation, and banishment of inanimate objects
which had been the cause of death, was founded on feelings widely
diffused throughout the Grecian world (see Pausan. vi, 11, 2;
and Theokritus, Idyll, xxiii, 60): analogous in principle to the
English law respecting deodand, and to the spirit pervading the
ancient Germanic codes generally (see Dr. C. Trümmer, Die Lehre
von der Zurechnung, c. 28-38. Hamburg, 1845).
The Germanic codes do not content themselves with imposing a
general obligation to appease the relatives and gentiles of the
slain party, but determine beforehand the sum which shall be
sufficient to the purpose, which, in the case of involuntary
homicide, is paid to the surviving relatives as a compensation;
for the difference between culpable homicide, justifiable
homicide, and accidental homicide, see the elaborate treatise
of Wilda, Das Deutsche Strafrecht, ch. viii, pp. 544-559, whose
doctrine, however, is disputed by Dr. Trümmer, in the treatise
above noticed.
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