This is the eighth volume on the Greek orators from Aris & Phillips Classical Texts, but the first in the series collecting speeches by the orator Isaeus. Often a difficult writer for new readers to get to grips with, the Classical Texts series offers the ideal format in which to meet Isaeus, providing a general introduction alongside introductions to each speech, facing-page translation and commentary. To have this first volume on Isaeus compiled by Brenda Griffith-Williams, one of few real experts on the orator in the anglophone world, is a boon.

The difficulty of Isaeus stems from the complexity of the legal cases his speeches cover. He specialized in inheritance cases, with 11 of his 12 surviving speeches addressing this topic (including the four collected in this volume). This means the reader must tangle with the intricacies of Athenian laws on inheritance, wills and adoption, as well as the often sprawling and contested family trees of the rival claimants – family trees which are made even more complicated by the Athenian tradition of passing down names through generations. Griffith-Williams’ goal is to guide readers through this legal web. Her stated aim is to ‘explain the legal framework of each case and show how the logographer’s rhetorical strategy was designed to achieve the desired legal outcome for his client’ (4). This approach is partially a response to the history of scholarship on Isaeus, as Griffith-Williams sets out in the general introduction. The last full set of commentaries in English, by William Wyse in 1904, is now well over a hundred years old and takes a rather dim view of Isaeus, presenting him as manipulative and with little regard for the letter of Athenian law. Griffith-Williams certainly rehabilitates the orator and presents a refreshed image of him as closely engaged with both law and rhetorical techniques.

The manuscript tradition of Isaeus is fairly uncomplicated, as Griffith-Williams notes, and thus the Greek text in this volume deviates from that of the Loeb edition in only three places, once at 1.47 and twice at 4.7. The true value of the volume is less in the Greek text than in the clear translations and the detailed but accessible introductions and commentaries, which are eminently successful in achieving Griffith-Williams’ goal of explaining the legal framework in each case. For example, in the introduction to Isaeus 1 On the Estate of Cleonymus, Griffith-Williams explains in straightforward terms the role of a will in this case and the position of wills in Athenian society more broadly. She establishes that wills were indeed documents with legal weight and that Athenian courts were not inherently prejudiced against them, as earlier scholars have suggested (see A.R.W. Harrison, The Law of Athens, Volume 1: The Family and Property (Oxford 1968) and W. Wyse, The Speeches of Isaeus, With Critical and Explanatory Notes (Cambridge 1904)). This in turn allows her to argue that Isaeus’ strategy is not purely based in Athenian morality and social norms but also has a legal basis. The author’s attention to legal detail makes her arguments compelling. In places, Griffith-Williams offers comparisons to modern English law to compare or contrast points of Athenian law, but at other times it is the immediate example of the case from Isaeus that allows her to explain clearly both the laws themselves and the speeches’ use of them. As a result, the reader is guided carefully through the intricacies of Athenian inheritance laws and is left with a clear overview of the many and varied possibilities for these laws’ application in practice. Family trees are provided for all four speeches and are presented as simply as possible, allowing the reader to orient themself within the relevant kinship structure as well as the legal one.

The commentaries, too, are extremely accessible and prepared in such a way that will make them useful for reference as well as interesting to read straight through. Griffith-Williams does not exclude comments on commonplace features of rhetoric, such as the address to the judges, which makes the volume useful even to those who are entirely new to the study of Athenian oratory. Equally, she pulls out key and sometimes complex legal terminology and connects it both to forensic and general usages to elucidate its meaning. For example, the commentary on Isaeus 1.3 explains that, in addition to ‘rely’, ischurizesthai often means ‘insist’ in the case of wills.

The clear, comprehensible style of the translations and commentaries in this volume will make it accessible to the very newest students as well as a useful addition to the libraries of those already familiar with Isaeus. I am pleased to see that it has been followed by a second volume by the same author covering Isaeus’ speeches 5 and 11 (Liverpool 2025).