On the Olive Stump

WitnessesWell now, since the termination of that time I have cultivated it myself. My accuser says that in the archonship of Souniades[*](397-396 B.C.) an olive-stump was uprooted by me. And the previous cultivators, who rented it from me for a number of years, have testified to you that there was no stump on the plot. I ask you, how could one convict the accuser more patently of lying? For it is not possible that the cultivator who came after cleared away what was not there before.