The Death of Socrates

The Death of Socrates

by
Jacques-Louis David
Greek philosopher Socrates was tried, convicted, and executed in Athens, Greece, in 399 B.C. At that time in Athens, criminal proceedings could be initiated by any citizen.  In the case of Socrates, the proceedings began when Meletus, a poet, delivered an oral summons to Socrates in the presence of witnesses.  The summons required Socrates to appear before the legal magistrate, King Archon,  in a colonnaded building in central Athens called the Royal Stoa to answer charges of impiety and corrupting the youth. 

The preliminary hearing before the magistrate at the Royal Stoa began with the reading of the written charge by Meletus.  Socrates answered the charge.  The magistrate questioned both Meletus and Socrates, then gave both the accuser and defendant an opportunity to question each other.  Having found merit in the accusation against Socrates, the magistrate drew up formal charges.

The document containing the charges against Socrates survived until at least the second century C.E.  Diogenes Laertius reports the charges as recorded in the now-lost document:

This indictment and affidavit is sworn by Meletus, the son of Meletus of Pitthos, against Socrates, the son of Sophroniscus of Alopece: Socrates is guilty of refusing to recognize the gods recognized by the state, and of introducing new divinities.  He is also guilty of corrupting the youth.  The penalty demanded is death.

Socrates spent his final hours in a cell in the Athens jail.  The ruins of the jail remain today.  The hemlock that ended his life did not do so quickly or painlessly, but rather by producing a gradual paralysis of the central nervous system.

The trial of Socrates, the most interesting suicide the world has ever seen, produced the first martyr for free speech.  As I. F. Stone observed, just as Jesus needed the cross to fulfill his mission, Socrates needed his hemlock to fulfill his. 

See: The Trial of Socrates by Doug Linder (2002).