William Watson Goodwin, Commentary on Demosthenes: On the Crown

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2. τοῦ (=τίνος) πρώτου μνησθῶ: indirect question (M.T. 677).—ὁ πατὴρ...ἐδούλευε: it is a hard problem for historical criticism to evolve the real father of Aeschines from this slave of a schoolmaster, seen with his feet in the stocks or wearing a wooden collar for punishment, and the patriotic citizen described by his son (Aesch. II. 147, III. 191), who had died about twelve years before at the age of ninety-five, who lived through the Peloponnesian war, in which he lost his property, was banished by the Thirty Tyrants, served his country bravely in Asia, was one of the restorers of the democracy under Thrasybulus, and in his old age discoursed learnedly and wisely to his son on the early history of the γραφὴ παρανόμων! Fortunately Demosth. speaks of him thirteen years before this, when he was still living, in XIX. 281, where he calls Aeschines the son of Atrometus the schoolmaster. From this respectable station he has now descended to be the son of Tromes, a schoolmaster's slave (see § 130.5).

3. πρὸς τῷ Θησείῳ: in XIX. 249, Atrometus is said to have kept school πρὸς τῷ τοῦ Ἥρω τοῦ ἰατροῦ, near the shrine of the Hero Physician. For this hero, the Scythian Toxaris, a friend of Anacharsis and Solon, see Essay VI. Cf. note on καλαμίτης (line 6).

4. διδάσκοντι γράμματα: the γραμ- ματιστής was a teacher of γράμματα, reading and writing, the earlier γραμματική.—χοίνικας παχείας, crassas compedis (Plaut. Capt. III. 5, 64), stocks or shackles for the feet: see Ar. Plut. 275, αἱ κνῆμαι δέ σου βοῶσιν ἰοὺ ἰοὺ, τὰς χοίνικας καὶ τὰς πέδας ποθοῦσαι.

5. ξύλον, a wooden collar, worn on the neck for punishment: see Ar. Nub. 592, ἢν φιμώσητε τούτου ν᾽ τῷ ξύλῳ τὸν αὐχένα, and Lys. 681. It meant also stocks for the feet, and the πεντεσύριγγον ξύλον was an instrument with five holes, for neck, arms, and legs. See Lexicon, ξύλον. —τοῖς μεθημερινοῖς γάμοις, a euphemism for daylight prostitution: the stories of the mother of Aeschines are as trustworthy as those of his father (see §§ 258, 259).

6. κλεισίῳ, a hut, opposed to a house, as in Lys. XII. 18, τριῶν ἡμῖν οἰκιῶν οὐσῶν,...κλείσιον μισθωσάμενοι. See Od. XXIV. 208.—πρὸς τῷ καλαμίτῃ ἥρῳ, near the shrine (or statue) of the hero καλαμίτης. Many identify this hero with the ἥρως ἰατρός of XIX. 249, notwithstanding strong objections. See Essay VI.

7. τὸν καλὸν ἀνδριάντα, the pretty doll: see Bekk. Anecd. 394, 29, ὡς ἐν τῇ συνηθείᾳ λέγουσιν αἱ μητέρες περὶ τῶν υἱῶν, “ὁ καλὸς ἀνδριάς μου.”—τριταγωνιστὴν ἄκρον, a tip-top third-part-actor: see §§ 262, 265, and XIX. 246, 247, 337.

8. ἀλλ᾽ ὡς: supply μνησθῶ from line 2, as a direct interrogative.— τριηραύλης, galley-piper, who gave the stroke to the rowers on a trireme.

9. ἀνέστησεν: “memineris prostare in lupanari Graece dici καθῆσθαι” (Dissen); there is also the idea of raising her from a low occupation. Cf. Aesch. I. 41.