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education in the roman empire 861
Progymnasmata of Aphthonius, a text written in the eleventh century, but
largely a compilation of tralatician clichés. ‘To those who have just come
from the study of poetry and its tales of marvels to the great mystery of
rhetoric, and who are eager to take their fill of its inspiration and grandeur
of thought, it is natural to feel no small sense of astonishment and not
ignoble confusion. The greatness of the reputation of the art and its
extraordinary renown make it reasonable to feel so much disquiet, and of
necessity engender in those of more noble spirit an eagerness commensurate
with their amazement. For the more difficult they hear this art to be,
and the harder to practise successfully, the greater the enthusiasm with
which they prepare themselves to succeed in an enterprise which for the
many is hard to comprehend and to grasp with the intellect, and so to
become distinguished in eloquence and enjoy widespread fame.’ 25
In late antiquity the general pattern of rhetorical teaching remained the
same in east and west, but many innovations made in the Greek world
remained virtually unknown in the Latin west. In the east a standard group
of textbooks was adopted, probably in the fifth century. The student began
by studying the Progymnasmata of Libanius’ student Aphthonius of
Antioch, which replaced earlier collections, but was itself not replaced in
general use by the less differentiated Progymnasmata of Nikolaos of Myra,
professor of rhetoric in Constantinople in the fifth century and friend of
the philosopher Proclus. All earlier theoretical handbooks had been superseded
by the four treatises of Hermogenes of Tarsus (c. 160–c. 225) – Peri
staseōn, Peri ideōn, Peri heureseōs and Peri methodou deinotētos – who had introduced
a much subtler analysis of style than the earlier doctrine of the three
stylistic levels. Both Aphthonius’ Progymnasmata and Hermogenes’ treatises
accumulated around themselves numerous commentaries. The earliest,
those of Syrianus and Sopatros on Hermogenes, were composed in the
fifth or sixth century. Aphthonios and Hermogenes’ works regularly occur
together in medieval manuscripts, which are probably descended from
teachers’ manuals of late antiquity. The two treatises on epideictic oratory
attributed to Menander were also in use as teaching manuals in late antiquity.
Western rhetorical teaching seems to have remained much as it was in
the days of Quintilian. There is no regular corpus of preliminary exercises.
Latin handbooks of rhetoric compiled in late antiquity by Julius Victor,
Fortunatianus, Julius Severianus, Augustine and Martianus Capella show no
trace of knowledge of Hermogenes or Menander. The only exceptions are
the fourth-century grammarian Grillius’ commentary on Cicero’s De inventione,
which appears to know some Hermogenian definitions, and the sixthcentury
grammarian Priscian, who introduced Hermogenian matter in his
25 Rabe (1931) 80–1.
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