How you, men of Athens, have been affected by my accusers, I do not know. But I myself almost forgot who I was because of them, so persuasively did they speak. And yet, so to speak, they have said nothing true at all.

The first word of the speech is a small joke. Socrates was famous for saying he knew nothing, and the first thing he tells the jury is something he does not know: how they have taken the prosecution. Then he pays his accusers a compliment that is really a charge. They spoke so well that he nearly lost track of himself, and none of it was true. Pithanōs, "persuasively," is the word at the centre of the whole trial: Athens is about to decide whether a good speech or a true one wins. The Greek for "true" is alēthes, from a-, "not," and the root of lanthanō, "escape notice." Truth is what is not hidden. The verb for "I forgot" in the line before, epelathomēn, comes from the same root. Socrates says the speeches made him forget himself, and that they hid the truth, with one root in both places.