Rhetoric was not as prolific in Rome as it was in Greece until the growing Roman Republic conquered Greece and began adopting the philosophies, rhetoric, and other studies that had evolved in Athens and the other Hellenistic city-states (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c). "Rome had been governed by a system that supposedly balanced democracy and oligarchy. Democratic assemblies voted on laws and holders of civic offices" (Bizzell & Herzberg 2001c, p. 33). Early Rome was primarily made up of Roman citizens and other individuals who were of a similar background and spoke a common, Latin, language. As Roman authority expanded beyond it's earliest borders and beyond Latin speakers, new means of public communication became necessary.
Roman rhetoric was, essentially, based on Platonic and Aristotelian premises, with Aristotle's work at the center of Roman oratory. "Theories of rhetoric taught by such writers as Cicero, Quintilian...as well as by most modern writers, are essentially Aristotelian. In a very real sense, the writers since Aristotle have simply refined his original theories, extending them only in rare cases" (McCroskey, 2016, p. 9). In contrast, much of the work of the Roman period through the Enlightenment was, essentially, a simplification of Aristotle with a focus on "how to" prepare rhetorical treatises (McCroskey, 2016).
The Rise of Rome
When the Empire rose, rhetoric was echoed Greek treatment as both a powerful tool for social control and a means of resisting and pointing out the Sophistry inherent in that control. As the Empire evolved, however, the political forces at work began to move away from the more reform-based ideals of Aristotelian Rhetoric. Rome's ruling class were familiar with Greek rhetoric, particularly in formerly Greek colonies. However, Rome also had a rising middle class, known as an "equestrian class" who made money as merchants of military supplies (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c). This middle class sought to win influence over the general public in ways that sometimes conflicted with the ruling class. To achieve this, reworking of rhetoric began to occur. In particular, emotional appeals and artistic approaches to rhetoric were viewed as more significant to good oratory than logic and credibility.
Cicero, an orator (speaker), lawyer, and Senator in Rome, was intrigued by what he viewed as the power of Rhetoric. He was not from one of the wealthy Roman families, but of the equestrian class (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c). Therefore his views were influenced by what he saw as a waning ruling class and a fear of the authority of Rome fading due to this recognition. Cicero became a proponent of Empire-building and a politician himself to defend the value of Roman law. With his legal and forensic rhetoric background, he felt that Rhetoric was an amazing tool for persuasion and social control, stating his amazement politicians and the Empire’s leaders, as well as the general population, could be swayed by one convincing orator. And so with the onset of the Roman Empire we enter a period of Rhetorical history focused on Great Oratory:
Cicero's own style is characterized by amplification—naming the same thing two of three different ways in succession, adding elaborating or qualifying clauses, and otherwise developing the periodic sentence....Cicero aims to evoke heightened emotions and at the same time to explore every facet of an idea—in Cicero's view, stylistic ornateness contributes to the development of content. (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001b, p. 285).
Here we can see how Cicero's approach varied from that of Aristotle, with the focus on ornateness and style rather than on the invention of the argument.
In order to use Rhetoric as a tool of Empire building, Cicero felt it important to focus on the artistry rather than the philosophy of Rhetoric. He is best known in Rhetoric for revising and tightening Aristotle's work, particularly the five Canons of Rhetoric. He also focused on Aristotle's three types of rhetoric, forensic, deliberative, and ceremonial. Cicero generated a number of handbooks detailing his interpretation of Aristotle's work (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c). His handbooks would become for later rhetoricians "the standard sources for the three categories of speech (deliberative, forensic, ceremonial) and also for the five canons of the rhetorical composing process (invention, arrangement, style, memory, delivery) (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001b, p. 283). Yet, unlike Aristotle, Cicero denies that Rhetoric is an art form—instead he claims that it is a culmination of the knowledge required for leadership, artistically and eloquently presented to a public. As such, he was a strong proponent for education and orators developing an extensive broad knowledge base (McCroskey, 2016). As a reflection of the growing needs of Rome and Roman communication, the need for a broad-based education becomes clear. And in a move very distinct from his Greek predecessors, Cicero’s focus is on speech-making and oratory skill, not on the ethics of message production and consumption.
Cicero's work on rhetoric was used for training men of the upper classes, including the equestrian class, of Rome. "The upper-class men who received the training reflected in these handbooks would use it to argue legal cases, to participate in political life, and to perform at private entertainments and family occasions such as funerals" (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c, pp. 34-35). Here the impact of Aristotle on Cicero is clear, as the handbooks guided speakers to forensic, deliberative, and ceremonial discourses. Cicero believed that good orators needed skills in all three of these areas, along with the general educational background to reinforce these abilities.
Cicero may not have placed the emphasis of Rhetoric on Aristotle’s Dialectic, but he did find the Canons of Rhetoric to be a significant boon for Roman oratory. However, unlike Aristotle’s focus on the first stages of the Canons, Cicero edits the Canons to better reflect Roman needs. Cicero’s Canons of Rhetoric are much more insistent on correct word choices and memorization than Aristotle’s. All of Cicero’s stages seem to lead up to the final canon—that the speech must be delivered with “dignity and grace.” This takes on characteristics of performative and theatrical rhetoric, focused on ethos and pathos that address the persona (character) of the audience (Cicero, 55 B.C.E./2001). He further suggests that audiences will be morally guided by the orator when that orator's persona fits the character of the audience, in other words, that the orator is capable of swaying audiences to the needs of the leadership of Rome.
The "Good Man Speaking Well"
Cicero’s changes to the Canons were reinforced by another Roman Orator and teacher: Quintilian. "Quintilian was the first teacher of rhetoric to be hired by the Roman government" (McCroskey, 2016, p. 10). Drawing on Cicero’s focus, when Quintilian wrote his treatises on Rhetoric he used “Oratory” and “Rhetoric” as interchangeable terms. These Institutio Oratoria (Institutes of Oratory) is a full educational program for teaching rhetoric, and challenged students to reflect Cicero's work and that "rhetorical skill be used only for moral ends" (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c, p. 38). Quintilian also echoed Cicero in providing a basis for rhetorical education rooted in liberal arts, and that teachers must encourage a fully-developed student.
Quintilian's project for rhetorical education is the most ambitious of any classical writer: He wants to produce the "good man speaking well," one who combines a Platonic commitment to virtue and absolute truth with the Isocratean and Ciceronian focus on effective public service. To produce this man, parents and teacher must begin at birth to draw out the boy's natural abilities and equip him with broad learning. (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001c, p. 39)
Quintilian's goals reflect many of Cicero's methods, and Quintilian saw Cicero as the best example of of a Latin rhetor. He openly explains that his work is derivative of Cicero and through him Aristotle (Quintilian, 95?/1921). Quintilian practiced rhetoric in an era where Roman political dialog was tightly controlled and censored by the Empire (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001e). Due to this censorship, Quintilian's focus remained primarily educational in context. Unlike Cicero, Quintilian's focus is primarily on forensic rhetoric, with data and evidence a primary concern, and contains a strong focus on the pedagogy of rhetoric. For Quintilian, ultimately good pedagogy and well trained teachers will influence the construction of "the good man speaking well".
Now we begin to see how Rhetoric has become, for some, “Speech-Making” rather than the study of messages and communication processes. This discussion of Rhetoric would continue to dominate academic approaches for more than one-thousand years. The core texts on Rhetoric that Quintillian created were used through the 18th century in Europe and the United States. Material adapted from these textbooks is still used in public speaking textbooks today.
The Fall of Rome and Rise of the Church
The collapse of the education and political systems of the Roman Empire, particularly the Western Roman Empire, had a profound impact on the history of rhetoric. As Europe entered what would come to be called the "Dark Ages" (Mommsen, 1942) rhetoric became the province of sophists (the Second Sophistic) who focused on distracting the masses from their hardships.
If we think of rhetoric in Aristotelian terms, we may say that there is little history of rhetoric during the middle ages. However, there was much that was called rhetoric. During this period a new group of sophists developed. These teachers of rhetoric had great prestige but used their position to amaze the audience rather than to persuade it. They employed flashy and elaborate style and delivery and were highly entertaining. (McCroskey, 2016, p. 11).
The "dark ages" is a label from Italian poet and humanist Francisco Petrarca, aka Petrarch from the early Renaissance that refers to the period just after the fall of Rome and lasts somewhere around 300 years. The Middle Ages is another label that encompasses both the dark ages and the following years until the Renaissance (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001d). Petrarch's label for the dark ages is significant because it refers to a time when the light of learning and artistry had been lost to the world, or when classical philosophy, rhetoric, art, literature, and science were not prevalent (Mommsen, 1942).
After the fall of Rome, the rise of the centralized Christian Church in Europe reinforced the Role of Rhetoric as a means of artistically presenting information to an audience. The power of the institution had moved to Constantinople with Constantine (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001d; Murphy, 1960), so the Roman Church sought means of accruing members and influence. The Church needed speakers, and saw Quintilian’s Rhetoric as a way of instructing its members and converting others to the faith. Looking back at Platonic Rhetoric was also useful to the Church, as they expanded on Plato’s arguments regarding True and False Rhetoric and turned those discussions into Faithful and Evil Rhetorics. There was little interest on the part of the Church leadership in exploring the philosophic side of Rhetoric in this era—the Church trained its leaders and priests in rhetorical skills and provided the substance of arguments to its speakers.This was, in a sense, a rebirth of sophistry both within the church and among the secular leaders and merchants who focused on self- and institutional- promotion (McCroskey, 2016).
St. Augustine is notably the most prolific rhetorician of the period (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001a, 2001d; McCroskey, 2016; Murphy, 1960). Writing primarily before the understood beginning of the "Dark Ages," before the influence of Rome fully waned, St. Augustine's primary concern with rhetoric was that it should be meaningful, as opposed to the entertainment-focused sophistry that was common at the time. Trained in Quintilian's format, St. Augustine was a teacher of rhetoric until his conversion to Christianity, and from there he focused on how rhetoric and classical learning could be relevant to the growing church (Bizzell and Herzberg, 2001d). Arguing that Christians would be foolish for ignoring the power of rhetoric, he sought to reframe it within Christian discourse.
Augustine focused his rhetorical treatises in terms of religious influence. Differing greatly from his own educational background, he argued particularly that the type of education needed for good rhetoric and oratory is a Christian one, with proper Church training or Divine influence. He reintroduced Platonic rhetorics to the Church, in contrast to Roman and Ciceronian reliance on Aristotle, as Platonic idealism was well-suited to Christian doctrine:
In The City of God he states that the Platonic philosophers come closer to the truth of Christianity than any other pagan thinkers. This view has influenced Western treatment of Plato well into modern times....On the one hand, he seems as suspicious of the declamatory rhetoric of the Second Sophistic—a subject he once taught—as Plato is of the Sophistic rhetoric he condemns. Sounding Platonic, Augustine insists that wisdom (comprising, for him, the understanding of the Bible) is more important that eloquence. (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001a, p. 451).
Augustine further repurposed rhetoric for the Church by re-defining the goals and purposes of rhetoric. He ranks dialectical logic highly in his work, but with the understanding that God's order was the core of true logic. He also warns against being tricked by Sophistry and empty but eloquent rhetoric (Augustine 397-400/1955; Murphy, 1960). He identified what he called the "rule of truth" (Augustine, 2001) that should foreground rhetoric and applied to the Catholic Traditional Catechism: the Christian should seek the truth (of God), bring others to that truth, and defend the truth (Farrell, 2008). The truth of God should be at the core of rhetoric, thus, to Augustine good rhetoric is for the good of the audience and people in general. The purpose of rhetoric, therefore, is to convince the audience to live good, Christian lives.
As prefaced in the video above, Augustine held appeal to audiences that would last through the "Dark Ages". As humans in this era were majorly reduced, after the collapse of roadways, welfare systems, aqueducts, and the political and economic might of the fallen empire, to subsistence levels of existence, the promise of a Platonic Ideal of "City of God" (Augustine, 412?/1871) beyond their earthly existence helped spread Christianity beyond the boundaries of the former Empire. Augustine's influence would continue for centuries, as his doctrines became the core of training for medieval preacher (Bizzell & Herzberg, 2001a). It wasn’t until the Renaissance and Reformation periods that we began to see resistance to what came to be recognized as Platonic Rhetorics and the return to Aristotle.
References
Augustine. (1955). Confessions and Enchiridion. A.C. Outler (trans.). Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press. Original work published 397-400.
Augustine. (2001). On Christian Doctrine. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 456-485). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Augustine. (1871). The works of Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, The City of God Vol. I. (M. Dods trans.). Edinburgh, UK: Murray and Gibb for T. & T. Clark. Original work published 413-426. Retrieved from Project Gutenberg https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4530...-h/45304-h.htm
Bizzell, P., & Herzberg, B. (2001a). Augustine. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 450-456). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Bizzell, P., & Herzberg, B. (2001b). Cicero. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 283-289). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Bizzell, P., & Herzberg, B. (2001c). Classical Rhetoric: Introduction. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 19-41). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Bizzell, P., & Herzberg, B. (2001d). Medieval Rhetoric: Introduction. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 431-449). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Bizzell, P., & Herzberg, B. (2001e). Quintilian. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 359-364). New York: Bedford/St. Martins.
Cicero. (2001). De oratore. In P. Bizzell & B. Herzberg (Eds.), The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present (2nd ed., pp. 289-339). New York: Bedford/St. Martins. Original work published 55 BCE.
Farrell, J.M. (2008). The rhetoric(s) of St. Augustine's Confessions. Augustinian Studies, 39(2), 265-291.
McCroskey, J.C. (2016). An introduction to rhetorical communication: A Western rhetorical perspective, 9th edition. New York: Routledge.
Mommsen, T.E. (1942). Petrarch's conception of the 'Dark Ages'. Speculum, A Journal of Medieval Studies, 17(2), 226-242. DOI: 10.2307/285364
Murphy, J.J. (1960). Saint Augustine and the debate about as Christian rhetoric. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 46(4), 400-410. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00335636009382439
Quintilian. (1921). The instituto oratoria of Quintilian, vol I, book II. (H.E. Butler, trans). London: W. Heinemann. Original work published 95?.
