An Athenian trial looked very different from a modern one. There was no professional judge, no lawyers for hire, no long process of appeals, and the whole case was decided in a single day.

The jury

Jurors were drawn from a pool of about 6,000 citizens chosen each year. They had to be male citizens over the age of thirty, and they swore an oath to judge according to the laws. Jurors were paid a small daily fee, enough to make service possible for poorer citizens, so many jurors were older men or men of modest means. For each trial a panel was selected by lot on the morning of the hearing, partly to make bribery difficult. Socrates' jury probably numbered about 500, possibly 501 to avoid ties.

Jurors were both judge and jury. They decided the facts, interpreted the law and chose the penalty. There was no judge to instruct them and no appeal from their decision.

Speaking for yourself

Each side presented its case in speeches. Litigants were expected to speak for themselves; they could not hire an advocate to argue for them, though they could hire a speechwriter to compose a speech they memorized, and friends could speak in support. Time was strictly limited, measured by a water clock, a jar that drained through a small hole. When the water ran out, the speaker stopped.

Speeches could appeal to character and emotion as much as to facts. It was common for a defendant to bring his weeping children into court to beg for mercy. Witnesses' statements were read out. The jurors then voted, without discussion among themselves, by dropping ballots into urns.

Two votes

For a case like Socrates', where no fixed penalty was set by law, there were two votes. First the jury decided guilt. If the defendant was convicted, the prosecution proposed a penalty, the defendant proposed an alternative, and the jury chose between the two. They could not invent a third option. This gave the defendant a reason to propose something serious enough that the jury might accept it.

Socrates' verdict

Socrates was convicted. In Plato's Apology he remarks that if only thirty votes had gone the other way, he would have been acquitted. With a jury of about 500, that suggests a vote of roughly 280 to 220. The city was divided.

The penalty

The prosecution proposed death. Socrates' counterproposal, as Plato tells it, startled the court. Asked what he deserved, he said that, as a benefactor of the city, he deserved free meals at the Prytaneum, the honor given to Olympic victors and public heroes. Then, more seriously, he offered a fine of one mina, a modest sum, and finally, at the urging of friends including Plato, thirty minae, with his friends guaranteeing payment.

The jury chose death. A later writer, Diogenes Laertius, claims that eighty more jurors voted for death than had voted for conviction. That figure is uncertain, but many readers think Socrates' defiant tone in the penalty phase turned some jurors against him.

How the votes were cast

In Socrates' day, jurors probably voted with pebbles or similar tokens dropped into one of two urns, one for conviction and one for acquittal. In the following century Athens introduced bronze ballot discs. Each juror received two: one with a hollow axle for the prosecution, one with a solid axle for the defense. Holding the axle between finger and thumb, he could drop his chosen disc into the counting urn without anyone seeing which one it was. Archaeologists have found such ballots in Athens. The secrecy protected jurors from pressure, an early version of the secret ballot modern democracies rely on.

Strengths and weaknesses

Athenian courts had real strengths. Large juries chosen by lot were hard to bribe or intimidate, and ordinary citizens, not a small elite, held judicial power. But the system had weaknesses that the trial of Socrates exposed: vague laws, no professional guidance on what the law meant, no appeal, a single day to decide a capital case, and a jury that could be swayed by reputation and public mood.

Worked example: Socrates in a modern court

Imagine the same case brought in a modern democracy with constitutional protections. What would change?

• The charge. Laws against holding the wrong religious beliefs would be struck down under freedom of religion. The prosecution would fail before trial.
• The speech. His questioning of public figures would be protected as free expression.
• The procedure. A judge would rule on what evidence was allowed and instruct the jury. He would have a right to a lawyer, more time, and the right to appeal.
• The penalty. Death for speech would be unthinkable in most democracies today.

But modern systems have their own risks. Cases can drag on for years, cost a fortune and depend on expensive lawyers. Athenians would point out that their courts were quick, cheap and run by citizens. The comparison is not only about which system is better. It shows that protecting individuals from a hostile majority requires more than majority voting: it requires rights the majority cannot easily override.