Demosthenes (Greek Δημοσθένης, Demosthenes) was one of the most important speakers in history and an important Athenian politician. He was born in Athens in 384. C. Calauria and died in the 322. C.
His oratory skills are the last significant expression of Athenian intellectual prowess and provide access to the details of the politics and culture of ancient Greece during the fourth century. C. Demosthenes learned rhetoric by studying the speeches of previous speakers. He delivered his first judicial speeches at the age of twenty, when he asked his tutors being handed their entire inheritance. For a time, Demosthenes made ​​his living as a professional writer and lawyer judicial speeches, writing texts for use in litigation between private parties.
Demosthenes became interested in politics during that time, and was in 354 a. C. when he gave his first political speech in public. He spent his years of physical and intellectual to oppose the expansion of the kingdom of Macedonia correctly. Idealized his city and fighting to restore the Athenian supremacy and motivate his compatriots to resist Philip II of Macedonia. He sought to preserve the freedom of Athens and establish an alliance against Macedonia in an unsuccessful attempt to impede Philip's plans to expand its influence southward, conquering the Greek city-states. Two years before Philip's death, Demosthenes played a leading role in the rise of Athens and Thebes against the Macedonian king and his son, Alexander III, at the Battle of Chaeronea, but their efforts were unsuccessful revolt when found with a strong Macedonian reaction. Moreover, to prevent a similar revolt against their own leader, the successor of Alexander the diádoco Antipater, sent his men to they finished with Demosthenes. Demosthenes, however, committed suicide in order to avoid falling into the hands of Archias, Antipater's confidant.