Demosthenes

Demosthenes (384–322 BCE) was an Athenian statesman and universally recognized as the supreme orator of ancient Greece. Overcoming a childhood speech impediment, weak lungs, and financial ruin caused by fraudulent guardians through legendary disciplined practice—speaking with pebbles in his mouth and shouting above crashing sea waves—he became a premier legal speechwriter (logographos) before entering public politics.

Demosthenes recognized the mortal threat posed by King Philip II of Macedon to the independent Greek city-states. In his blistering Philippics and Olynthiacs, he rallied Athenian civic courage and organized an anti-Macedonian coalition that fought at Chaeronea (338 BCE). In his oratorical masterpiece On the Crown (330 BCE), he delivered the ultimate moral vindication of his patriotic policies. Cornered by Macedonian agents on Calauria island, he swallowed poison hidden inside his reed pen rather than yield.