The Euboean Oration or Euboicus (Greek, Ancient (to 1453);: Εὐβοϊκὸς λόγος ἢ κυνηγὸς |euboikos logos e kynegos|Euboean oration, or the hunter, Oration 7 in modern corpora) is a speech delivered by Dio Chrysostom in the early second century AD, dealing with the relationship between virtue and poverty and drawing a contrast between rural and urban life. The speech's name derives from the extended anecdote in the first part of the speech in which Dio describes a poor hunter whom he met after being shipwrecked on the island of Euboea. It has been treated as an important historical source for the state of the countryside and civic life in Greece under the Roman Empire.
The overall argument of the work is that poverty is compatible with a virtuous life. A contrast is drawn between the countryside, where it is easy to be poor and virtuous, and the city, where there are many obstacles to a virtuous life for the poor.
The speech broadly breaks down into two halves. The first half (sections 1-79) recounts how the speaker was shipwrecked on Euboea and met a rustic hunter, who tells him of his one journey to the city, where he successfully defended himself before the Assembly on charges of failing to contribute financially to city life, and offers the speaker hospitality. The narrative implicitly establishes the hunter as virtuous despite his poverty, comparing his life to that of the ideal state presented by Plato in The Republic. After a bridging section (80-103), criticising the hospitality offered by the rich characters in Homer's Odyssey, the second half (104-152) of the speech considers whether virtuous poor like the hunter can exist in an urban context, concluding that it is possible so long as they avoid taking up jobs that deform or weaken their body or that require them to behave unethically.
Tale of the Hunter (1-79):
Bridging section (80-103)
Virtue in the city (104-152)