Athenian popular courts did not operate under the same rules of evidence or proof that we are accustomed
to in a modern courtroom. In fact, it cannot be said that there were rules regarding these matters at all, nor
was there a judge to enforce them if they had existed. The court before which Socrates was tried was
presided over by one of the magistrates of the state whose annual appointment was determined by lot and
the jury consisted of 501 Athenian citizens. A jury of this size was not at all unusual in Athens; the large
number was intended to frustrate the expected attempts at bribery and to encourage the notion that the jury
was genuinely representative of the citizen body. (In fact, since the pay for jury duty was less than what an
able-bodied man could expect to earn from manual labor, the jurors tended to be poor, elderly, and, if we
are to believe Aristophanes’ satire of the legal system in his comedy The Wasps, notably ill tempered.)
There was no arm of state government that was charged with prosecuting violations of law; rather, it was
up to individual citizens to bring charges, and often individuals were inspired to bring charges from
personal or political motives.
Almost nothing about the trial of Socrates apart from its outcome is free from controversy. We do not
know what the real motives were that caused these charges to be brought, nor do we know what
arguments were used on either side. Three Athenian citizens joined in the accusation of Socrates, two of
whom are quite obscure but the third, Anytus, was a prominent political figure. He had been a general
during the Peloponnesian War and was instrumental in the restoration of democracy in 403 BC. Following
the Athenian surrender in 404, Sparta had allowed an oligarchic government to take power in Athens.
This government consisted of 30 wealthy Athenian citizens who came to be known as The Thirty Tyrants
because their brutal and rapacious regime resulted in the murder of hundreds of democratic leaders and
the confiscation of their property. Anytus and several other supporters of the democracy went into exile
during the “tyranny” of The Thirty. When they returned in 403 to overthrow the government of The Thirty
and restore the democracy, there was bitter resentment of those who had been sympathetic toward The
Thirty. In order to minimize the damage that this resentment might cause, an amnesty was enacted that
prohibited the prosecution of Athenian citizens other than The Thirty for crimes committed before 403.
This amnesty had the effect of encouraging a certain degree of creativity on the part of those who wished
to indulge their resentment and to demonstrate the power of the newly restored democracy.
The accusation of Socrates may have been one of the many creative prosecutions that ensued. For some
members of The Thirty and a number of their relatives and supporters had been among the young men who
were known to have associated with Socrates. Of these, the most notorious was Critias, who was the most
ruthless and despised member of The Thirty. Critias was also the author of tragedies and philosophical
works. These works have not survived, but we do have a fascinating 40-line quotation from one of his
dramas in which a character claims that “some devious and clever man” fabricated the idea of the gods in
order to intimidate wrongdoers with the threat of divine punishment. Sentiments like this could easily be
thought to derive from the corrupting influence of the godless man whom Aristophanes had portrayed in
The Clouds. Another Athenian who was known to have associated in his youth with Socrates was
Alcibiades. Alcibiades was not connected with The Thirty, but he had been accused of involvement in the
vandalizing of the herms in 415, when he was one of the 10 Athenian generals. Rather than face
prosecution, he had fled to the enemy and had joined the Spartan war effort against Athens. Socrates was,
then, guilty of association with notorious enemies of the democratic state and this undoubtedly contributed
to his prosecution and eventual condemnation.
What was it that attracted Critias, Alcibiades, and many other wealthy and talented young Athenians to
Socrates? The fact of the matter is that we do not know. Nor, presumably, did the members of the jury. The
jurors’ ignorance encouraged them to imagine the worst and to vote to condemn him to death. Our
ignorance encourages the writing of countless books and articles on “the Socratic problem.” The problem
consists in the fact that the only direct evidence we have, apart from The Clouds, that derives from people