Hypereides or Hyperides (Ancient Greek: Ὑπερείδης, Hypereidēs; c. 390 – 322 BC; English pronunciation with the stress variably on the penultimate or antepenultimate syllable[1]) was an Athenian logographer (speech writer).
He was one of the ten Attic orators included in the "Alexandrian canon" compiled by Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace in the third century BC.
His speeches are believed to have led to the outbreak of the Lamian War (323–322 BC) in which Athens, Aetolia, and Thessaly revolted against Macedonian rule.
After the decisive defeat at Crannon (322 BC) in which Athens and her allies lost their independence, Hypereides and the other orators were captured by Archias of Thurii and condemned to death by the Athenian supporters of Macedon.
After being put to death, his body (according to others) was taken to Cleonae and shown to the Macedonian general Antipater before being returned to Athens for burial.
In the second part of the papyrus, he attacks Philippides and his associates and states: Each one of them was a traitor, one in Thebes, another in Tangara, another in Eleutherae, doing everything in the service of the Macedonians.
In 1847, large fragments of his speeches, Against Demosthenes and For Lycophron (incidentally interesting for clarifying the order of marriage processions and other details of Athenian life, and the Athenian government of Lemnos) and the whole of For Euxenippus (c. 330 BC, a locus classicus on εἰσαγγελίαι eisangeliai or state prosecutions), were found in a tomb at Thebes in Egypt.
In 1856 a considerable portion of a logos epitaphios, a Funeral Oration over Leosthenes and his comrades who had fallen in the Lamian war was discovered.
[5] Towards the end of the nineteenth century further discoveries were made including the conclusion of the speech Against Philippides (dealing with an indictment for the proposal of unconstitutional measure, arising out of the disputes of the Macedonian and anti-Macedonian parties at Athens), and of the whole of Against Athenogenes (a perfumer accused of fraud in the sale of his business).
[5] In 2002 Natalie Tchernetska of Trinity College, Cambridge discovered fragments of two speeches of Hypereides, which had been considered lost, in the Archimedes Palimpsest.
[10] This prompted the establishment of a working group under the auspices of the British Academy, which includes scholars from the UK, Hungary and the US.