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Menesaechmus

Athenian orator

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 15, 2026
Entity authorityQ3333231
Source-derived summary

Menesaechmus (Ancient Greek: Μενέσαιχμος; lived during the 4th century BC), an Athenian and an inveterate enemy of the orator Lycurgus, by whom he was impeached on a charge of impiety and convicted. When Lycurgus felt his end drawing near (323 BC), he had himself brought into the council to give an account of his public conduct, and Menesaechmus was the only man who ventured to find fault with it. He continued his hostility to the sons of Lycurgus after their father's death, and so far succeeded in a prosecution against them, that they were delivered into the custody of the Eleven. They were released, however, on the remonstrance of Demosthenes.

References

Smith, William (editor); Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, "Menesaechmus", Boston, (1867)

Notes

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Menesaechmus” is athenian orator. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Menesaechmus, Athenian and orator, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1867, 1870—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date -0350. For this dossier, Menesaechmus, Athenian and orator is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “athenian orator” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3333231. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1867 and 1870.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Menesaechmus” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.