Apology

1. embroidered (adjective):

filled with fictitious or exaggerated details

“From me you will hear the whole truth, though not, by Zeus, gentlemen, expressed in embroidered and stylized phrases like theirs.” (Page 22)

2. dialect (noun):

a form of language particular to a region or social group

“Just as if I were really a stranger, you would certainly excuse me if I spoke in that dialect and manner in which I had been brought up.” (Page 23)

3. formidable (adjective):

inspiring respect or fear by virtue of one’s strong qualities

“These I fear much more than I fear Anytus and his friends, though they too are formidable.” (Page 23)

4. default (noun):

something that is standard, perhaps because it goes unchallenged

“Moreover, these accusers are numerous, and have been at it a long time; they spoke to you at an age when you would most readily believe them, some of you being children and adolescents, and they won their case by default, as there was no defense.” (Page 23)

5. maliciously (adverb):

in a manner characterized by an intent to do harm

“Those who maliciously and slanderously persuaded you—who also, when persuaded themselves then persuaded others—all those are most difficult to deal with.” (Page 23)

6. uproot (verb):

pull out of the ground

“I must surely defend myself and attempt to uproot from your minds in so short a time the slander that has resided there so long.” (Page 24)

7. affidavit (noun):

a written statement, the truth of which is supported by an oath or legal affirmation

“I must, as if they were my actual prosecutors, read the affidavit they would have sworn.” (Page 24)

8. sophists (plural noun):

paid teachers, often associated with clever—but mistaken—arguments

“Indeed, I learned that there is another wise man from Paros who is visiting us, for I met a man who has spent more money on sophists than everybody else put together, Callias, the son of Hipponicus.” (Page 25)

9. preen (verb):

congratulate oneself

“Certainly I would pride and preen myself if I had this knowledge, but I do not have it, gentlemen.” (Page 25)

10. slanders (plural noun):

false oral statements defaming a person

“From where have these slanders come?” (Page 25)

11. irrefutable (adjective):

impossible to deny or disprove

“I must give you an account of my journeyings as if they were labors I had undertaken to prove the oracle irrefutable.” (Page 27)

12. interlocutor (noun):

a person involved in a conversation or dialogue

“[M]any slanders came from these people and a reputation for wisdom, for in each case the bystanders thought that I myself possessed the wisdom that I proved that my interlocutor did not have.’” (Page 27)

13. oracular (adjective):

relating to an oracle; difficult to interpret

“What is probable, gentlemen, is that in fact the god is wise and that his oracular response meant that human wisdom is worth little or nothing.” (Page 27)

14. pestilential (adjective):

tending to cause an infectious disease

“They say: ‘That man Socrates is a pestilential fellow who corrupts the young.” (Page 28)

15. vehement (adjective):

forceful or intense

“These people are ambitious, violent, and numerous; they are continually and convincingly talking about me; they have been filling your ears for a long time with vehement slanders against me.” (Page 28)

16. suffice (verb):

be enough or adequate

“Let this suffice as a defense against the charges of my earlier accusers.” (Page 28)

17. frivolously (adverb):

in a manner that lacks seriousness or importance

“He says that I am guilty of corrupting the young, but I say that Meletus is guilty of dealing frivolously with serious matters.” (Page 28)

18. benefactors (plural noun):

people who give money or help to a person or cause

“You mention a great abundance of benefactors. But what about the audience? Do they improve the young or not?” (Page 29)

19. drachma (noun):

a silver coin of Ancient Greece

“Are you so contemptuous of these men and think them so ignorant of letters as not to know that the books of Anaxagoras of Clazomenae are full of those theories, and further, that the young men learn from me what they can from time to time for a drachma, at most, in the bookshops.” (Page 31)

20. insolent (adjective):

showing a rude or arrogant lack of respect

“The man appears to me, men of Athens, highly insolent and uncontrolled.” (Page 31)

21. deposition (noun):

the process of conveying sworn evidence

“You must have made this deposition, Meletus, either to test us or because you were at a loss to find any true wrongdoing of which to accuse me.” (Page 32)

22. nymphs (plural noun):

mythological spirits depicted as beautiful maidens

“If, on the other hand, the spirits are children of the gods, bastard children of the gods by nymphs or some other mothers, as they are said to be, what man would believe children of the gods to exist, but not gods?” (Page 32)

23. contemptuous (adjective):

expressing or feeling hatred or disapproval

“According to your view, all the heroes who died at Troy were inferior people, especially the son of Thetis who was so contemptuous of danger compared with disgrace.” (Page 33)

24. acquit (verb):

free from a criminal charge

“Socrates, we do not believe Anytus now; we acquit you, but only on condition that you spend no more time on this investigation and do not practice philosophy, and if you are caught doing so you will die.” (Page 34)

25. exhort (verb):

strongly urge someone to do something

“I shall not cease to practice philosophy, to exhort you and in my usual way to point out to any one of you whom I happen to meet: ‘Good Sir, [...] are you not ashamed of your eagerness to possess as much wealth, reputation, and honors as possible, while you do not care for nor give thought to wisdom or truth, or the best possible state of your soul?’” (Page 34)

26. gadfly (noun):

a fly that bites livestock; an annoying person

“I was attached to this city by the god—though it seems a ridiculous thing to say—as upon a great and noble horse which was somewhat sluggish because of its size and needed to be stirred up by a kind of gadfly.” (Page 35)

27. commonplace (adjective):

ordinary

“The things I shall tell you are commonplace and smack of the lawcourts, but they are true.” (Page 36)

28. begrudged (past tense verb):

envied or resented the enjoyment of something

“If anyone, young or old, desires to listen to me when I am talking and dealing with my own concerns, I have never begrudged this to anyone, but I do not converse when I receive a fee and not when I do not.” (Page 37)

29. enjoined (past tense verb):

instructed; prescribed an action or attitude to be performed or adopted

“To do this has, as I say, been enjoined upon me by the god, by means of oracles and dreams, and in every other way that a divine manifestation has ever ordered a man to do anything.” (Page 37)

30. supplicate (verb):

ask or beg for something earnestly and humbly

“I do not think it right to supplicate the jury and to be acquitted because of this, but to teach and persuade them.” (Page 39)

31. inordinately (adverb):

to an unusually or disproportionately large degree

“I should have to be inordinately fond of life, men of Athens, to be so unreasonable as to suppose that other men will easily tolerate my company and conversation when you, my fellow citizens, have been unable to endure them, but found them a burden and resented them so that you are now seeking to get rid of them.” (Page 41)

32. denigrate (verb):

criticize harshly

“It is for the sake of a short time, men of Athens, that you will acquire the reputation and the guilt, in the eyes of those who want to denigrate the city, of having killed Socrates, a wise man.” (Page 41)

33. lamentations (plural noun):

passionate expressions of grief or sorrow

“I was convicted because I lacked not words but boldness and shamelessness and the willingness to say to you what you would most gladly have heard from me, lamentations and tears and my saying and doing many things that I say are unworthy of me but that you are accustomed to hear from others.” (Page 42)

34. reproaching (verb):

addressing someone with disapproval or disappointment

“You are wrong if you believe that by killing people you will prevent anyone from reproaching you for not living in the right way.” (Page 42)

35. demigods (plural noun):

minor deities with lesser or partial divine status

“If anyone arriving in Hades will have escaped from those who call themselves jurymen here, and will find those true jurymen who are said to sit in judgment there, Minos and Rhadamanthus and Aeacus and Triptolemus and the other demigods who have been upright in their own life, would that be a poor kind of change?” (Page 43)