[55]
Adrastus, on his return from the expedition against Thebes where he had met with disaster and had not by his own efforts been able to recover the bodies of those who had fallen under the Cadmean fortress, called upon our city to lend aid in a misfortune which was of universal concern, and not to suffer that men who die in battle be left unburied nor that ancient custom and immemorial law1 be brought to naught.
1 The dead had a divine right to burial. See Isoc. 12.169 and Soph. Ant.