Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University History Dissertations Department of History 8-7-2018 Cicero's de Oratore from Antiquity to the Advent of Print Joanna Jury Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/history_diss Recommended Citation Jury, Joanna, "Cicero's de Oratore from Antiquity to the Advent of Print." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2018. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/history_diss/68 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of History at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CICERO’S DE ORATORE FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE ADVENT OF PRINT by JOANNA JURY Under the Direction of Nick Wilding, PhD ABSTRACT Why did the first printers in Italy choose Cicero’s de Oratore in 1465? How did it come to epitomize Renaissance theories of education by the text’s rediscovery in 1421? Studies of Ciceronian oratory have traditionally fallen into two camps: philological scholarship focused on Cicero’s rhetorical works as they were produced during the ancient Roman Republic, and, historical studies of the reception of Cicero’s speeches among later humanists. This bifurcation of scholarship has often overlooked, however, the titular role played by Cicero’s theory of education and its articulation in his philosophical treatise on rhetoric, the de Oratore. A philosophical dialogue that described Cicero’s ideal orator, de Oratore offered a unique vision of what it meant to be “educated.” This interdependent vision of rhetoric and philosophy embodied in the de Oratore, as well as the text's legacy of transmission through Roman imperial and Late Antique writers, inspired the literati of the Renaissance to adopt the Ciceronian corpus into the humanistic curriculum and, more importantly, to base a western concept of education on Ciceronian principles of oratory. This project analyzes Ciceronian oratory within its ancient context and demonstrates the fragility of de Oratore’s transmission from antiquity to the early modern period. The argument hinges strongly on understanding the reception of the de Oratore during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as a printed object. Using the introductions, front matters, and marginalia of early printed texts, I show that humanist scholars engaged with Cicero and his vision of "philosophical oratory.” This research makes several important contributions to the fields of both classical and Renaissance scholarship. Close study of the de Oratore as both a text and object demonstrates that Cicero’s rhetorical importance in the western tradition is not limited to the transmission and adoption of his (more well-known) speeches. Joint consideration of the philosophical content and ancient historical setting of the text and its later receptive contexts bridges the persistent divide that has separated classical and early modern scholarship. Finally, studying the receptions of Cicero’s de Oratore from antiquity through its rediscovery and distribution during the Renaissance, furthers scholarly understanding of western conceptualizations of education. INDEX WORDS: Classical reception, Textual transmission, Oratory, Renaissance humanism, Sweynheym and Pannartz, Aldine press CICERO’S DE ORATORE FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE ADVENT OF PRINT by JOANNA JURY A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2018 Copyright by Joanna Carol Davis Jury 2018 CICERO’S DE ORATORE FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE ADVENT OF PRINT by JOANNA JURY Committee Chair: Nick Wilding Committee: Shane Butler Jared Poley Jake Selwood Electronic Version Approved: Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University May 2018 iv DEDICATION There are many people who have supported me while I worked to complete this dissertation, and I cannot hope to name all of them here. Two of you, however, deserve all the recognition and gratitude I might be able to give. First, since she was there at the beginning, I dedicate this project to my Mama, Marie Davis. Thank you for listening to that very first essay I wrote on the de Oratore as an undergrad at LaGrange College. Your encouragement never wavered, and I feel certain that there will soon be a printed copy of this to sit beside your copy of the MA thesis. And to my partner and best friend, I could not have done this without you. Thank you, Daniel, for your unrelenting love and support. I am beyond grateful for all the opportunities that you made possible, from living and working abroad that I may complete research, to cooking all those dinners so that our daughter had something delicious to eat. Without the two of you, this never would have been written. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This study could not have been completed without the research grants generously awarded by several institutions. I would like to thank the Columbia University Libraries, the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, the Huntington Library, Ca’Foscari and the Erasmus + Scholarship, and the Provost’s Dissertation Fellowship at Georgia State University. I would also like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to those who have mentored and directed all the research and writing for this project. To Lela Urquhart, thanks for believing in the project from the beginning and helping to frame it. To Jared Poley, thanks for helping to arrange research opportunities and for your work in the project’s defense. To Shane Butler and Jake Selwood, thanks for the time you spent reading and critiquing the dissertation and considering its merits (and weaknesses) for future scholarship. And finally, to Nick Wilding, thanks for the many, many meetings where you discussed my ideas and theories and helped to make sense of them. Thank you for reading through numerous drafts and offering commentary on how to improve them. Thank you for being a friend throughout the entire process. I could not have done this without you. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................... V LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................... XI 1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Arguments ...................................................................................................... 2 1.2 Methodology................................................................................................... 4 1.3 Historiography and Context .......................................................................... 5 1.4 Chapter Summaries ..................................................................................... 15 2 DE ORATORE IN THE LATE ROMAN REPUBLIC ....................................... 16 2.1 The Roman Republic ................................................................................... 17 2.1.1 Early Roman Education .......................................................................... 19 2.1.2 The Greek Art of Rhetoric in Rome ........................................................ 21 2.1.3 Cicero’s Early Life and Education .......................................................... 27 2.2 The Appearance of Latin Rhetorical Handbooks ....................................... 29 2.2.1 de Inventione............................................................................................. 33 2.2.2 Rhetorica ad Herennium .......................................................................... 36 2.2.3 Cicero’s “Youthful” Ideal of Oratory ..................................................... 39 2.3 de Oratore ..................................................................................................... 41 2.3.1 de Oratore in Cicero’s Life ....................................................................... 42 2.3.2 Cicero’s Self-Fashioning .......................................................................... 42 vii 2.3.3 Overview of Contents............................................................................... 44 2.3.4 The Dialogue: Genre, Techniques, and Cultural Meaning .................... 45 2.3.5 Greek Arts in Rome ................................................................................. 50 2.4 Cicero’s Cultural Ideal ................................................................................ 52 2.4.1 Talent vs. Training ................................................................................... 53 2.4.2 Political and Social Responsibilities of the Orator ................................. 55 2.4.3 Philosophers vs. Rhetoricians .................................................................. 57 2.4.4 Creating an “Art” of Oratory.................................................................. 59 2.4.5 Marriage of Eloquence and Wisdom ....................................................... 61 2.5 Conclusion: The Ideal Orator ..................................................................... 64 3 SURVIVAL FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE CAROLINGIAN AGE ................ 65 3.1 de Oratore in the Roman Empire................................................................. 66 3.1.1 Oratory during the Principate................................................................