Against Spudias

"Against Spudias" (Ancient Greek: Πρὸς Σπουδίαν ὑπὲρ Προικός) was an oration composed by Demosthenes which concerned the division of the estate of Polyeuctes.

[1] It is the forty-first in the corpus of Demosthenic speeches which have been preserved.

[2] The speech is particularly interesting to scholars because it shows that the actions of women differed significantly from historians' usual views of Athenian expectations surrounding women's behaviour.

[1] It also contains the only example in classical Athenian oratory of the father of the bride initiating a divorce.

Spudias and the plaintiff were the sons-in-law of Polyeuctes,[5] and on his death they both brought suits against one another over the handling of the estate.