Demosthenes

It was for this reason, as it seems, that he did not pursue the studies which were suitable and proper for a well-born boy, and also because of his bodily weakness and fragility, since his mother would not permit him to work hard in the palaestra, and his tutors would not force him to do so. For from the first he was lean and sickly, and his opprobrious surname of Batalus is said to have been given him by the boys in mockery of his physique.

Now Batalus, as some say, was an effeminate flute-player, and Antiphanes wrote a farce in which he held him up to ridicule for this. But some speak of Batalus as a poet who wrote voluptuous verses and drinking songs. And it appears that one of the parts of the body which it is not decent to name was at that time called Batalus by the Athenians.

But the name of Argas (for they tell us that Demosthenes had this nickname also) was given him either with reference to his manners, which were harsh and savage, the snake being called argas by some of the poets; or with reference to his way of speaking, which was distressing to his hearers, Argas being the name of a composer of vile and disagreeable songs. So much on this head.

The origin of his eager desire to be an orator, they tell us, was as follows. Callistratus the orator was going to make a plea in court on the question of Oropus,[*](In 366 B.C. Oropus, a town on the confines of Attica and Boeotia, was wrested from Athens by the Thebans. Subsequently there was a trial for treason at Athens, in which Callistratus the orator and Chabrias the general figured, but the details of the trial are obscure.) and the trial was eagerly awaited, not only because of the ability of the orator, who was then at the very height of his reputation, but also because of the circumstances of the case, which was notorious.