6 - From Athens to Rome

Summary

Dionysius of Halicarnassus was a close reader of Plato and his engagement with the Phaedrus occupies an important position in his rhetorical essays and in his treatment of Lysias and Isocrates in particular. Between Plato and Dionysius, however, were three centuries of thinking and writing about rhetoric, compiling and commenting on the works of Attic orators, speechwriters, philosophers. Hence, before looking at Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ rhetorical essays, a brief overview of the reception of Lysias and Isocrates in the centuries between Plato and Dionysius is in order, so as to gain a good insight into the background for Dionysius’ work and to better assess his contributions to ancient rhetorical theory. The following overview will proceed roughly along chronological lines, focusing primarily on more substantial evidence on Lysias and Isocrates that we have from Ps. Demetrius, Philodemus and Cicero.

Dionysius of Halicarnassus was a close reader of Plato and his engagement with the Phaedrus occupies an important position in his rhetorical essays and in his treatment of Lysias and Isocrates in particular. Between Plato and Dionysius, however, were three centuries of thinking and writing about rhetoric, compiling and commenting on the works of Attic orators, speechwriters, philosophers. Hence, before looking at Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ rhetorical essays, a brief overview of the reception of Lysias and Isocrates in the centuries between Plato and Dionysius is in order, so as to gain a good insight into the background for Dionysius’ work and to better assess his contributions to ancient rhetorical theory.¹ The following overview will proceed roughly along chronological lines, focusing primarily on more substantial evidence on Lysias and Isocrates that we have from Ps. Demetrius, Philodemus and Cicero.

6.1 Post-Fourth-Century BCE and Hellenistic Receptions of Lysias and Isocrates

Lysias and Isocrates had very different fates in post-fourth-century and Hellenistic rhetorical criticism: on Lysias we know very little and have few papyri from that period, whereas Isocrates seems to loom large in common perception about Hellenistic education, philosophy and rhetoric.² Research into Hellenistic oratory and rhetoric is growing, but it is also a complicated field due to lack of evidence on rhetorical activity from that period.³ Polybius, of course, is a major source for Hellenistic history and speechwriting, but he by no means aims to record rhetorical theory and does not mention Lysias and Isocrates in his work.⁴

Lysias

Even though Diogenes Laertius’ records suggest that Lysias (and his family) had a relatively lively afterlife in Academic circles (see above, Chapter 1.2.), we know very little about the reception of his works and persona from the fourth century to the first century bce. We do have papyri of Lysias’ corpus, but they are very few and in general offer inferior readings in comparison to the existing manuscript tradition.⁵ With the exception of the treatise by Ps. Demetrius (more below), whose dating is continuously controversial, Lysias seems to disappear almost completely from our records after the fourth century bce. Indeed, before his renaissance in the first century bce there are only two relatively obscure references by Peripatetic philosophers to a Lysias that may potentially have something to do with the famous Lysias of the fourth century bce. Clearchus of Soloi, a disciple and close confidant of Aristotle, uses the name ‘Lysias’ for a character in his dialogue On Sleep (Περὶ ὕπνου), but the significance of this choice of name, and in fact the overall interpretation of Lysias in the dialogue, remain unclear.⁶ The second Peripatetic to mention Lysias is Ariston of Ceus,⁷ who deals with the character type εἴρων (‘dissembler’) in fragment 21m and in one of the examples uses both Phaedrus and Lysias. There is clearly a strong Platonic influence lurking behind this passage, as in most (Peripatetic) treatises of this particular character type,⁸ and commentators have found parallels for this character depiction in Plato’s Gorgias, Phaedrus and Euthydemus. In any case, it is difficult to say what significance this reference has, other than to show that Lysias – and the Platonic portrayal of Lysias in particular – might have had a relatively interesting afterlife in philosophical circles, of which we know, unfortunately, frustratingly little.

Isocrates

The reception of Isocrates in that same period is a completely different matter. Even though none of the works of his students have survived and we do not have other works that offer direct engagement with Isocrates’ writings, we can suppose a relatively broad Isocratic influence from the fact that we have many papyri from this period, indicating that he must have been widely read at least in Hellenistic Egypt.⁹ We also hear from various secondary sources about the importance of his school and the success of his students. Isocrates’ influence on the Hellenistic period, and particularly on Hellenistic historiography, has been a very controversial topic, which in itself is not the focus of this overview. However, in the course of revisiting some of the sources, it will emerge that Isocrates seems to have been less influential than he appears, for example, in the account of Werner Jaeger,¹⁰ and at the same time more influential than argued by some contemporary historians.¹¹

From the scattered evidence, it seems that we can speak of Isocrates’ influence in four main areas: (1) theater, (2) historiography, (3) language and style, and (4) political philosophy.

The most problematic of these four categories is Isocrates’ connection to the first, the tragedians: there is a tradition according to which Astydamas and Theodectes, the foremost tragedians of the fourth century bce, were pupils of Isocrates.¹² The evidence that Xanthakis-Karamanos invokes in support of her claim that ‘Isocrates […] seems to provide a link between rhetorical development and fourth-century dramatic poetry’ relies entirely on the Suda and on a comparison with, and stylistic evaluation of, the fragmentary evidence of the contemporary dramatists.¹³ This is not entirely persuasive: the later tradition in literary criticism that was motivated to identify teacher–pupil relationships among earlier writers might well have imposed this framework and created a thematical link between the writers without much concern for historical reality. Hence, the importance and influence of Isocrates on tragedy cannot be maintained with much confidence.

One seems to be on firmer ground in historiography.¹⁴ Debates on this issue focus on the so-called Isocratean school of history, and argue that Theopompus (of Chios) and Ephorus, who were apparently writing in Isocratean style, were not only instructed by Isocrates to write history, but also told what kind of history they should write.¹⁵ Furthermore, even though none of their works actually survive, some scholars have gone on to suggest that both Theopompus and Ephorus wrote a moralizing history which was imbued with rhetorical decorations and distortions of historical truths, thus following what some have taken to encapsulate ‘Isocratean’ ideology.¹⁶ Recent scholarship has, rightly, pointed to the extremely scarce evidence to support these broad claims and has questioned whether Isocrates had any associations with history writing at all.¹⁷ Indeed, Isocrates never wrote history himself nor can we glean from his writings any programmatic views about historiography. As Marincola has rightly emphasized in a recent article, however, history itself was an important topic for Isocrates and provided material and inspiration for his teachings and writings.¹⁸ Given that Isocrates had regarded his school as an educational center that prepared students for careers in a variety of different fields, such may well have been also his reception and influence on later writers. In other words, even though he did not author works of history himself, his philosophy, attention to writing, traditions and cultural memory might well have been very inspirational for historians.

In any case, even if we reject the view that Theopompus and Ephorus were exercising Isocratean political thought or philosophy in their histories, this does not change the fact that they were perceived already in antiquity as part of the Isocratean school and that almost all our existing evidence on Isocrates from the fourth and the third centuries connects the Isocratean school (whatever this might mean) overwhelmingly with historians: a fragment of Callisthenes of Olynthus (Fr. 44.2–5 FGrH 124) recounts Isocrates’ failed attempt to call for peace in the latter’s letter to Philip. Two of Ephorus’ fragments, preserved in the lexicon of Harpocration, mention Isocrates, and are used as a source for explaining (or providing an exegesis of) certain Isocratean words.¹⁹ The testimonia of Anaximenes, the rhetorician and historian who has been considered as the author of the Rhetoric to Alexander,²⁰ refer to an engagement with Isocrates’ work, but we do not have any explicit mention of Isocrates in Anaximenes’ fragments nor in the rhetorical treatise that has come down under his name.²¹ Philochorus, another important fourth-century historian of Athens and a source for Dionysius of Halicarnassus, refers in his fragments to Isocrates and recounts, among other things, a story about Plato rejecting the opportunity to have a statue erected in his honor in the manner of Isocrates.²² Finally we have Demetrius of Phalerum, a philosopher and a historian, date Isocrates’ death in a fragment.²³ Much later, Dionysius of Halicarnassus connects Timaeus (late fourth- and third-century bce historian) with Isocrates and counts him among the many unsuccessful imitators of Isocratean style.²⁴ All those brief snippets taken together highlight Isocrates’ role as a teacher (rather than simply stylist or rhetorician) and, in the case of Philochorus, as head of a philosophy school rivaling the famous ones by Plato and Aristotle.

The third and second centuries bce, despite providing even patchier information about Isocrates, boast two important sources that indicate the importance of Isocrates for the period: Hermippus of Smyrna (or the Callimachean), a grammarian and a historian, who was mostly known for his work on ancient biographical tradition,²⁵ and Hieronymus, the philosopher. Athenaeus, Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Harpocration all claim that Hermippus wrote books about Isocrates and, importantly, a separate book On the Pupils of Isocrates.²⁶ A recent commentator on Hermippus has suggested that the ‘Hermippean material was firmly entrenched in the literary tradition concerning the fourth-century rhetoricians’ and that ‘more of it may be thought to persist, albeit completely anonymously, in the still extant works’. Bollansée points out an important detail – that Hermippean material plays a crucial role in the establishment of the tradition of Isocrates’ numerous and important pupils.²⁷ As Cooper and Bollansée have both argued, Hermippus’ approach to Isocrates was similar to the way he aimed to create a biographical continuity between philosophers through the idea of διαδοχή (succession).²⁸ Hermippus seems to have applied the same approach to Isocrates and other contemporary orators/rhetoricians. Or perhaps it is worth considering the possibility that Hermippus had not, contrary to what Bollansée and Cooper suggest, treated Isocrates as a rhetorician, but rather as a philosopher-rhetorician? Such a reading would indeed offer a better explanation for two important things: first, his attempt to create a professional heir and succession for Isocrates would make sense as a comparison to other philosophers and teachers (it might have been felt to be a badly needed desideratum), and second, this would help better explain why he does not really mention orators in his works. Hermippus mentions Demosthenes, for example, only in fragments preserved in the book on Isocrates’ pupils, and there does not seem to have been a separate treatise on him.

Engels has discussed in greater detail the school of Isocrates and concludes that based on our current information it is difficult to find any clear-cut political, rhetorical or even generic link that would connect all those names who have been listed among Isocrates’ students.²⁹ If we take seriously the ending of Isocrates’ Panathenaicus, which stages a dialogue with one of his students who holds evidently different political views from Isocrates himself (12.200–65), we might wonder why should we expect Isocrates’ students to exhibit similar political belonging, especially in the context of political turmoils and the geographical breadth of the Hellenistic empire.³⁰ Cooper and Bollansée have both instead suggested that Hermippus’ motivation for emphasizing Isocrates and creating the idea of rhetorical ‘succession’ might have been entirely detached from the political/philosophical implications of rhetoric, and was purely an idea to map the history of Attic prose and its development.³¹ For this, I find little evidence, especially since all preceding snippets and fragments on the reception of Isocrates in the fourth and post fourth century bce have pointed clearly to his appreciation as a teacher and head of a philosophical school. Excellence of prose and emphasis on writing were definitely an important part of Isocratean education and seem to have remained so also in the reception of his work and influence in later periods. However, given the wide spread of his works, our evidence does not seem to support the claim that Isocrates became valued for Hermippus simply as a stylist of Attic prose.

Hieronymus of Rhodes offers us another perspective on the reception of Isocrates in the third century bce. A philosopher, he is also interested in rhetoric and criticizes Isocrates for his style which makes his speeches ineffective in delivery.³² Mirhady has suggested that this fragment also contains an implicit criticism of Isocrates’ pedagogical work. Indeed, even if Isocrates was loud and clear about not having engaged in forensic speechwriting,³³ his famous works are nevertheless composed as speeches. Furthermore, if Kremmydas’ argument is to be followed that rhetorical education at the time was probably based primarily on imitation,³⁴ it is easy to see why Isocrates – one of the most widely read authors of the Hellenistic period – would be criticized. In any case, Hieronymus’ interest in Isocrates seems to be further evidence that suggests that Isocrates might have been a far more important focus for the third-century theoreticians for oratory and rhetoric than other famous fourth-century practitioners of rhetoric/oratory (e.g. Demosthenes). Hieronymus’ complaints that Isocrates’ work is not fitting for imitation also seems to suggest a context where advocates of Isocrates’ writing would perhaps argue the other way around and aim to compose speeches for delivery that are inspired by Isocratean prose. One might speculate that because of the wide readership that Isocrates’ works enjoyed, it is possible that he also started to become increasingly valued for providing a paradigm of a kind of oratorical style. A style that is sophisticated, complex and difficult to access and imitate without advanced school instruction. In other words, Isocrates, the teacher and philosopher, may have started to occupy a place in people’s minds within the canon of Attic oratory and taken as a representative of style. Most of first-century bce criticism, starting with Dionysius of Halicarnassus, will work very hard to rectify this misunderstanding of Isocrates as an example of style and bring back his contributions to philosophy and education.

Lastly, an area where Isocrates might have been of importance is the discourse of kingship and its implications for political philosophy. However, even if the debates about different ways of life – the contemplative versus the practical – still seem to have had some currency in philosophical discourses after Aristotle (e.g. Cicero Att ii.16.3), it is not clear whether Isocrates was in any way considered part of the debate. Isocrates is mentioned by two fourth-century bce philosophers, Praxiphanes and Speusippus. Praxiphanes is reported to have written a work that depicts Plato (ὁ φιλόσοφος) as a friend of Isocrates (Ἰσοκράτει φίλος ἦν) having a discussion about poetry in Plato’s country house, and thus thematizing the intriguing relationship between Isocrates and Plato.³⁵ Speusippus’ letter to Philip II is overtly hostile against the Isocratean school and propagandistic in favor of Plato. The context of its writing has been debated,³⁶ but it is clear that the writer of this letter had Isocrates’ To Philip in mind and, with an aim to diminish Isocrates’ importance in Philip’s court, also serves as good evidence for the political influence of Isocrates and his school at the end of the fourth century bce. In other words, Isocrates was seen as a legitimate rival by Academic philosophers and we can thus infer that he had a politically appealing vision of philosophy to offer to rulers.

Scholarly evaluation of Isocrates’ possible contributions to political philosophy (as to philosophy more generally) has been harsh. With regard to the later Hellenistic period, for example, Schofield argues that most of what we know of the Hellenistic discourse on kingship seems to have very little philosophical ambition and that the almost total absence of information about the contents of the works written on this topic at that period suggests ‘that a Stoic or Epicurean work on kingship was not the place to look for major or distinctive statements on issues of philosophical importance, but only for variations on stock themes inherited from To Nicocles and similar writings’.³⁷ Isocrates seems to have been an important role model for those writing on kingship, and Schofield’s discussion of Aristeas and Philodemus confirms this: according to him, the few sources that we do have discussing kingship show resemblance to the Isocratean To Nicocles, in that they map out the duties of a king and mention various spheres of regal conduct or interest, but offer neither theoretical discussion of the different forms of government and their comparative merits, nor any defense of kingship as the best institution. Indeed, given the fact that Isocrates’ works are so richly attested in papyri (in particular his To Demonicus, To Nicocles and Nicocles),³⁸ thus indicating that he was very widely read across the Hellenistic empire, we would expect that Isocrates was influential for Hellenistic thinking about monarchy. However, while we see that he was read, our scarce evidence from that period does not indicate that Isocrates had also inspired theoretical engagement with political philosophy.³⁹

Given the extremely volatile political environment after Alexander and the emergence of rather unstable Hellenistic kingdoms,⁴⁰ it is perhaps not altogether surprising that the works of Isocrates (and especially those with a focus on kingship, like To Nicocles) would find particularly wide readership. What exactly were the contexts in which Isocrates was read and whether or how it translated to other aspects of the socio-cultural milieu in the Hellenistic world, is very hard to tell. It is tempting to think that Isocrates’ appeal rested in his advocacy of panhellenic unity that was based on a mobile understanding of education: through paideia, everybody could become cultured Greeks, and therefore members of the elite. But it is also possible that due to his wide appeal on a pedagogic and ideological level, Isocrates was read in some quarters as a paradigm for prose writing and, as a consequence, that his style of writing may have been imitated in schools. If so, this would explain the fierce opposition we see in later literary critics and rhetorical theorists to the influence of Isocrates. Even though his style of writing (and philosophy) was never intended as a sample of public speech, he seems to have found followers and imitators precisely in those quarters. The result was probably pretentious prose that was looked down upon by later teachers of rhetoric and philosophy.

6.2 Ps. Demetrius on Lysias and Isocrates

Before we come to the first-century bce criticism, there is one final important source for the reception of Lysias and Isocrates to discuss – Pseudo-Demetrius. The general and growing consensus about Ps. Demetrius’ On Style is that it was written sometime in the second or the first century bce, thus preceding Dionysius of Halicarnassus,⁴¹ and that it presents us with a unique resource for post-Aristotelian stylistic criticism and rhetoric. Scholars have already paid attention to the similarities of various linguistic theories in the works of Dionysius and Ps. Demetrius,⁴² but there has not been comparable interest in looking at their use of rhetoricians. Both Lysias and Isocrates have a place in this work and in both cases Ps. Demetrius’ discussion sheds valuable light on the critical ideas about these writers that were probably floating around between the fourth and first centuries bce. It is important to bear in mind that when Ps. Demetrius uses ancient authors as examples of certain styles, he does not divide the styles between the writers, as we will see in Dionysius of Halicarnassus, but instead draws examples for one particular style from a variety of different authors. Ancient authors, in Ps. Demetrius’ conception, rarely write in only one style, but often display features of a variety of different modes of writing.

Ps. Demetrius on Lysias

Ps. Demetrius mentions Lysias explicitly in three passages: first, in the introduction to the elegant style and charm (χάρις, §128), second in relation to plain style (§190), and thirdly in the discussion about wit (§262). I will briefly review these references in more detail.

Paragraphs 128–89 of Ps. Demetrius’ On Style tackle the elegant (γλαφυρός) style, which he describes as speech with charm (χαριεντισμός) and a graceful lightness (ἱλαρός). He then continues the discussion by referring explicitly to charm (χάρις), rather than the elegant (γλαφυρός) style, and goes on to divide χάρις into two larger categories: the poetic χάρις, which is more imposing (μείζων) and dignified (σεμνότερος), and a more ordinary χάρις, which is closer to comedy and resembles jests (σκῶμμα).⁴³ Lysias is evoked as an example of the latter kind and Ps. Demetrius quotes a few examples from Lysias to illustrate the ‘comic’ χάρις.⁴⁴ The critic is eager to pin down further what he means by χάρις and distinguishes between a χάρις that emerges from the content (πρᾶγμα) and that which results from style (λέξις). The examples of the content that give rise to χάρις are marriage songs and ‘everything Sappho wrote’ (ὅλη ἡ Σαπφοῦς ποίησις). Its counterpart, λέξις, is expressed less explicitly. The examples seem to suggest that there are two kinds of stylistic devices an author can use to create charm: first, personification (133), and secondly, the use of contrasting tone, so as to add a lighter pitch to an otherwise gloomy topic (134). Ps. Demetrius considers the latter to be the most effective kind of χάρις (ἐστι καὶ ἡ δυνατωτάτη χάρις) and one which most depends on the writer (μάλιστα ἐν τῷ λέγοντι), for it requires skill to demonstrate that in a topic ‘hostile to charm’ (πολέμιον χάριτι) ‘playfulness is possible’ (ἀπὸ τῶν τοιούτων παίζειν ἔστιν).

Within Ps. Demetrius’ discussion of χάρις, Lysias’ writings seem to belong to the type of χάρις that is created through style rather than the subject matter (as in Sappho). Even though it is never spelled out explicitly, Lysias might also be counted among those writers whom Ps. Demetrius praises for being able to create a lighter tone in somber topics (the example he uses is drawn from Homer), for even with all the seriousness of the forensic genre, Lysias’ speeches also demonstrate that it tolerates some lightness and wit. Ps. Demetrius, having categorized the various usages of χάρις in literary criticism, goes on to dedicate most of the discussion of the elegant style to schematizing ways in which χάρις can be created in literature. What is curious, however, is that despite having initially introduced Lysias among the first authors in the context of χάρις, Lysias is not mentioned in any of the following examination of different kinds of χάρις. He simply seems to prefer to use Xenophon and Plato (for prose), Sappho (for lyric poetry) and Sophron and Aristophanes (for mime and comedy). It might be, but this is difficult to say with more certainty, that Ps. Demetrius’ tepid interest in Lysias reflects the contemporary perception of the importance of this orator for literary criticism and rhetoric, where he was popular enough to be mentioned briefly as an example of χάρις, but had not yet become as securely connected with the ‘canon’ of classical writers or as exclusively associated with χάρις as we see in Dionysius below.

In §190 Ps. Demetrius briefly quotes an example from Lysias’ speech On the Murder of Eratosthenes (Lysias 1), but does not discuss the speechwriter again in the context of plain style. His examples of plain style are taken from Homer, Xenophon and Plato. Lysias is mentioned one more time, in §262, where he discusses how an element of playfulness, otherwise associated with the elegant style, can actually contribute to the forceful style. The example Ps. Demetrius uses is the same he used in the first Lysias passage when he discussed the elegant style. In itself this is not surprising, for the playful element that Ps. Demetrius is concerned with here is the same he was discussing in the context of elegant style earlier. Overall, despite the fact that Lysias plays a minor role in Ps. Demetrius’ work, we can nevertheless glean from his discussion, however brief, that Lysias is associated primarily with wit and simplicity. Given the influence of Lysias on later literary criticism and in particular for his influence on plain style, it is important to notice that the speechwriter’s own charm was probably not much appreciated in the centuries before the first century bce.

Ps. Demetrius on Isocrates

Ps. Demetrius serves as a valuable intermediary source also for the reception of Isocrates, who is mentioned explicitly in four passages:⁴⁵

1. 1 In §12, when he discusses two different kinds of period, he refers to the works of the Isocrateans (τῶν Ἰσοκρατείων ῥητορειῶν), Gorgias and Alcidamas as examples for the compacted style (τῆς ἑρμηνείας ἡ μὲν ὀνομάζεται κατεστραμμένη).

2. 2 In §29, which focuses on assonance and brings as examples the antitheses of Isocrates and Gorgias, who make use of assonance for imposing grandeur on the composition.

3. 3 In §68, where he discusses an element otherwise considered as the trademark of Isocratean prose, the avoidance of hiatus. He claims that there are two extremes, Isocrates and his followers who avoid any clash of vowels (Ἰσοκράτης μὲν γὰρ ἐφυλάττετο συμπλήσσειν αὐτά, καὶ οἱ ἀπ̓ αὐτοῦ), while others admit everything that happens to occur (ἄλλοι δέ τινες ὡς ἔτυχε συνέκρουσαν καὶ παντάπασι). Ps. Demetrius advises his reader, in an unsurprising move coming from a Peripatetic sympathizer, to follow the middle way.

4. 4 Hiatus is also the reason Isocrates is mentioned once more in this work. In §299 Ps. Demetrius claims that ‘smoothness of composition, of the kind particularly used by the Isocrateans (οἱ ἀπ̓ Ἰσοκράτους), who avoid any clash of vowels, is not well suited to forceful speech (δεινὸς λόγος)’.

What is perhaps striking in Ps. Demetrius’ discussion of Isocrates in On Style is that he is often mentioned either as a member of a stylistic movement/trend (together with Gorgias and Alcidamas) or associated with a group of followers, the Isocrateans. This group will be discussed in more detail in the following chapter on Philodemus, who refers to them relatively frequently. Compared to Philodemus, their presence is clearly less marked in Ps. Demetrius, but these few instances in On Style suggest that Isocrates seems to have had devoted and vocal followers, whether the author has in mind immediate students of Isocrates or later followers who identified themselves as the ‘Isocrateans’.⁴⁶ Ps. Demetrius’ use of Isocrates also suggests that, whatever his reception in philosophical circles, Isocrates also accumulated following, either for his general style or its specific features (hiatus, sentence structure), in stylistic and rhetorical circles.

Overall, despite the fact that Ps. Demetrius has clearly only lukewarm interest in Lysias and Isocrates, On Style nevertheless casts an interesting perspective on the two writers. For the first time we see Lysias associated in a programmatic work on rhetorical style with plain style, charm and wit, and Isocrates linked strongly to literary stylists, showing that his writings were probably increasingly used, at least in some quarters, as examples of an oratorical style to be imitated. Aside from the reception of Lysias and Isocrates, however, Ps. Demetrius’ use of critical terminology – as we will see in the following chapter – is very close to that of Dionysius of Halicarnassus.⁴⁷

6.3 The Reception of Lysias and Isocrates in Cicero and Philodemus

Philodemus and Cicero were both prolific writers whose works reveal a great deal about their intellectual environment and enable us to access sources not otherwise available to us. They were both active around the same time (from early to mid first century bce) and we know that Cicero was at least familiar with Philodemus’ works as he alludes to him in his In Pisonem (70).⁴⁸ Despite Philodemus’ Epicureanism, which Cicero opposes, he receives a more positive treatment from Cicero for his engagement with rhetoric, a topic otherwise spurned by the ‘orthodox’ Epicureans.⁴⁹ The following discussion will be focused strictly on the treatment of Lysias and Isocrates in the context of their works. We will be looking mainly at Philodemus’ On Rhetoric and Cicero’s Orator, Brutus and De oratore.⁵⁰

Philodemus and Isocrates

Despite making several references to Isocrates, Philodemus’ On Rhetoric and the role of Isocrates in that work have not elicited much scholarly discussion.⁵¹ The most extensive and by now almost canonical treatment of this topic is an article by Hubbell from 1916, which argues that there was something of an ‘Isocratean revival’ in early first-century bce philosophy and criticism and that Philodemus’ numerous references to Isocrates in On Rhetoric are critically replying to this newly found fascination for the orator.⁵² In Hubbell’s thesis, Isocrates is treated by Philodemus as a stylist and an exponent of sophistical rhetoric (more on this term below), a field that according to the Epicurean is incapable of preparing the young for a successful career in public and private life. Hence, studying Isocrates is a waste of time for those interested in such matters. This interpretation has provided the backbone of most (if not all) scholarly approaches to this topic: Isocrates is exclusively viewed as a stylist whose influence – Philodemus allegedly argues – on education is (or ought to be) negligible. There are, however, some problems with this interpretation. First, there is a question about sophistic rhetoric as an only rhetorical art form, and second, Hubbell may not be representing the popularity of Isocratean works and education adequately so that a better understanding of the context might also shed new light on the complicated textual fragments. Let us first start, however, with laying down some groundwork of what we know about rhetoric among the Epicureans and in Philodemus in particular.

According to the Epicurean tradition, the philosopher should avoid getting involved with public life, and thus also with the study of rhetoric for the purposes of public life.⁵³ Epicurus’ own relationship to rhetoric is open to speculation,⁵⁴ though it is clear from Philodemus that some Epicureans regarded rhetorical training to be beneficial for the philosopher ‘as an aid to literary composition’.⁵⁵ Epicurean rhetoric has sometimes been divided into three separate categories, sophistical (σοφιστική), rhetorical or judicial (ῥητορική) and political rhetoric (πολιτική), thus terminologically different from, though thematically similar to, the tripartite Aristotelian division into epideictic, forensic and deliberative rhetoric.⁵⁶ A closer examination of Philodemus’ Rhetoric makes this claim unsustainable: Philodemus does not think that rhetoric can be meaningfully divided into three genres.⁵⁷ Instead, we ought to regard these three categories as differences in ‘rhetorical speaking’ and not strictly as three separate genres of rhetoric.⁵⁸ The more fundamental difference emerges rather between art and non-art, between the goals of the types of rhetorical speaking (i.e. persuasion or instruction).

Whatever the disagreements otherwise, most critics agree that Philodemus treats only sophistical rhetoric as an art,⁵⁹ for it is the only form of rhetoric that is following certain principles of composition which apply to the majority of cases, and which produces ‘a result that is beyond the power of those who have not studied it’.⁶⁰ In the first book of the Rhetoric, Philodemus says that ‘sophistic rhetoric is an art (τέχνη) concerned with display pieces (ἐπιδείξεις)’ (Sudhaus i:122.29). In other words, sophistic rhetoric seems rather similar to what we would call (after Aristotle) epideictic oratory. For Epicureans it is the only form of rhetoric that is a proper τέχνη and thus the only kind of rhetoric that could be actually studied. Both judicial and political rhetoric are used in the context of politics and they both depend mostly on practice and experience.⁶¹ Hence, since neither of the two is based on general rules that we can all have access to, they cannot be studied. Indeed, Philodemus argues that the ability ‘to speak in assembly and court comes from practice and observation of political events’ (Sudhaus i:121 xxi.35–xxii.7).⁶² In other words, these two categories, ‘artistic’ rhetoric and ‘political’ rhetoric, do not overlap in their usage or practice, because they have fundamentally different structures and different goals. Hence, an aspiring politician or public figure should not be advised to attend a rhetorical school, for example, because it will only educate him in the art of sophistical rhetoric which encompasses (what some might call) philosophy, literature, composition and language. The rhetorical schools will not, however, be able to prepare the young for ‘real life’ debates and affairs in politics.⁶³

It is less clear what exactly is the proper domain relevant to sophistic rhetoric. Given that it requires a grasp of some set of general principles related to thought and composition, and given that it seems to be understood primarily in connection with praise and blame,⁶⁴ it is possible that we ought to think here beyond simple display speeches and instead consider the possibility that the associated discipline we should be thinking of is philosophy.⁶⁵ This suggestion is strengthened by the fact that Philodemus himself had apparently composed a book on praise,⁶⁶ though we do not know more about the content of this work. Whatever the implications of this possibility for Epicurean philosophy, it is surely true that a somewhat more positive evaluation of sophistic rhetoric in the context of philosophy might also cast a different light on Philodemus’ treatment of Isocrates, who seems to be explicitly associated with sophistic rhetoric and is mentioned several times throughout the work.

Philodemus argues, for example, that Isocrates’ works reveal themselves to have been composed ‘not without method’ (οὐ- | κ ἀμε]θόδως),⁶⁷ and that he must have possessed some kind of knowledge even though he himself denies it.⁶⁸ Isocrates is hence understood as a practitioner of sophistic rhetoric and he is in some passages also explicitly called a sophist, contrasted to orators and statesmen like Pericles, Demosthenes and Lycurgus (Sudhaus ii.97.10 and ii.233.11). Here we need to bear in mind that the term ‘sophists’ may have had a somewhat broader application for Epicureans and Stoics than simply evoking the group of fifth-century intellectuals we know from Plato. Indeed, for Epicureans sophists are any kind of intellectual opponents, both within and outside the Garden.⁶⁹ They are therefore credited with philosophically challenging arguments, which might nevertheless be (and mostly are) wrong and have to be refuted. However, sophists are philosophical opponents to Epicureans and as such associated with things more important than mere oratory. Isocrates is referred to as a sophist in just these circumstances and contrasted in a few passages to representatives of other philosophical schools.

In the fourth book of the Rhetoric (Sudhaus i.147–8 Col. ii), for example, Philodemus appears to say that the term ‘philosophy’ used in Isocratean discourses denotes a broader sense of intellectual pursuit, and as such stands in contrast to the narrower practice of philosophy we find among the Peripatetics and the Stoics.⁷⁰ Furthermore, when discussing the famous anecdote about how Aristotle got involved with rhetoric (as a response to Isocrates, whose dominance in the field he wanted to crush), Philodemus comments that unlike Aristotle who stooped down from philosophy to rhetoric, Isocrates at least moved on to things more important and beautiful than rhetoric: εἰ πρότερον ἐδίδασκεν αὐτήν, ἐπὶ τὴν ἡσυχιωτέραν καὶ δαιμονιωτέραν ὥσπερ εἶπε φιλοσοφίαν, ἀποχωρεῖν (Sudhaus ii.60.7–12).⁷¹ Two important observations are in order. First, even though one might get the sense from this and other references to Isocrates that the latter might have been recognized by Philodemus (and perhaps also by some other Epicureans) as a philosopher, we should approach such suggestions with caution. Isocrates never was a ‘proper’ philosopher in Epicurean/Philodemean terms and thus remains an opponent (and a sophist) to true Epicureans. However, he is contrasted here positively to Aristotle and hence regarded as someone who possessed an art and had some business with philosophy and someone who might have had at least the good intuition of recognizing philosophy (even if this was not the true Epicurean philosophy).⁷² Perhaps the most plausible and least committed reading of this section would be something like this: Philodemus really focuses here on attacking Aristotle and for that, it was convenient to use Isocrates, who had been cast in the history of the philosophical and rhetorical tradition as his fiercest opponent, as more philosophical than Aristotle. The emphasis, therefore, was probably not on Isocrates being a philosopher, but rather that Aristotle was so non-philosophical that even Isocrates was more of a philosopher than Aristotle. Secondly, it is very plausible that a comparison involving Isocrates with another intellectual and philosopher (here Aristotle) that concludes favorably to the former is explicitly drawing on the final part of Plato’s Phaedrus. This complements well the previous reading: even though recognizing that Isocrates was not a ‘proper’ philosopher, he does linger at the fringes of the philosophical tradition and thus has ‘some’ philosophy and there is ‘some’ merit to his works. Predicting his progress to philosophy, as Socrates does in the Phaedrus, seems to have become a particularly poignant aspect in the reception of Isocrates. Hence, it is rather plausible that Philodemus is drawing, rather cleverly, on the authority of Plato’s Phaedrus to play the figure of Isocrates (as more consistently committed to philosophy) against Aristotle who is attacked fiercely throughout the book. This may mean many different things, but perhaps most importantly for the present discussion this passage indicates that – unsurprisingly – Plato’s Phaedrus has remained an important reference text for conversations about the true meaning and application of rhetoric. Furthermore, the Platonic image of Isocrates who is progressing to philosophy and thus has more relevant contributions to make to rhetoric and philosophy is emerging from those much later accounts of Isocrates, thus maintaining a continuity of his presence in philosophical conversations about philosophical and rhetorical education.

While Hubbell suggests that Philodemus’ engagement with Isocrates indicates a resurgence of his importance in the first century bce, we have thus far seen that Isocrates’ presence in Hellenistic education seems to have been ubiquitous. It is of course true that we have lacunose evidence of rhetorical theory from the Hellenistic period and cannot say much with certainty about the importance and relevance of Isocrates’ work for the more theoretical engagements with philosophy and rhetoric in that period. However, the abundance of Isocratean papyri from Hellenistic Egypt strongly bolster the possibility that he was widely read, if not highly inspirational for theorists and philosophers, in the periods leading up to his explicit emergence in rhetorical criticism in the first century bce. Even though Isocrates was surely not a mainstream thinker to be discussed in philosophical schools in the context of metaphysics or epistemology, it is likely that he demanded attention in the context of rhetoric and education more generally. If that is true, then Philodemus (and other Epicureans) are not simply grappling with a new emerging group of Isocrateans, but rather engaging with an important authority on the question of rhetoric and its function in philosophical education.

Cicero and Isocrates

On the Roman side of the debate we find Cicero, who has already been mentioned as a possible supporter of some of Isocrates’ views and their appeal for a broader understanding of philosophy. Cicero’s interest in and use of Isocrates as a source for his own philosophical/rhetorical program has proven to be a difficult topic to tackle because, despite several apparent thematic affinities in their work and Cicero’s occasional praise of Isocrates as a master and teacher of eloquence, Cicero’s works contain very few direct indications or explicit statements that he was drawing in any substantial way on Isocrates’ philosophy.⁷³ This has led scholars to suppose that the praise of Isocrates in some passages of Cicero’s work is intended to evoke Cicero’s debt to Isocrates as his model of style and prose writing.⁷⁴ Laughton and Weische have rightly drawn attention to the fact that in passages where Cicero mentions Isocrates, his writings and style are not really admired as models for ‘real’ (courtroom) oratory.⁷⁵ Instead, Isocrates is primarily revered as a teacher (magister) of rhetoric or educator of aspiring public intellectuals.⁷⁶ Indeed, the idea of merging rhetoric and philosophy into one mutually supportive discipline seems to characterize, in a very broad sense, the preoccupations and intellectual program of both Cicero and Isocrates. Cicero’s De oratore (but also his De republica), a work inspired (in his own words) by Aristotle and Isocrates,⁷⁷ is perhaps one of the most ambitious examples of this endeavor. Regardless of the similarities in the broad outline of their programs, the comparison between Cicero and Isocrates falls apart as soon as one sets out to examine their works in more detail. Cicero neither acknowledges Isocrates’ influence upon his philosophical thought nor does he tell us more precisely where in the outlook of his works the Isocratean inspiration might lie. I argue that this incongruity is mainly due to Cicero’s own philosophical affiliation with Academic skepticism that operated with a very specific understanding of the notion of philosophy and left little room for an Isocratean broader definition of the concept, however it may have otherwise fitted Cicero’s own philosophical, rhetorical and political agendas. Cicero does acknowledge the ‘pre-Socratic’ broad notion of philosophy, when he writes in De oratore that

is eis qui haec quae nos nunc quaerimus tractarent, agerent, docerent, cum nomine appellarentur uno quod omnis rerum optimarum cognitio atque in eis exercitatio philosophia nominaretur, hoc commune nomen eripuit, sapienterque sentiendi et ornate dicendi scientiam re cohaerentis disputationibus suis separavit. (iii.60)

the people who discussed, practiced, and taught the subjects and activities we are now examining bore one and the same name (because knowledge of the most important things as well as practical involvement in them was, as a whole, called philosophy), but he robbed them of this shared title. And in his discussions he split apart the knowledge of forming wise opinions and of speaking with distinction, two things that are, in fact, tightly linked.⁷⁸

I take this passage to be, on the one hand, a reference to the general aim and ideal of Cicero’s program of joining the disciplines of philosophy and rhetoric, and on the other, a reflection on the contemporary challenges to traditional interpretations of philosophy with its implications for the perception of the wise and honorable men in society. Cicero cannot go back to the fourth century bce and ignore the way philosophy had since become institutionalized and used in the context of philosophical schools and education. Thus, whenever Cicero mentions philosophy, he is talking from the perspective of his own philosophical affiliation – Academic skepticism. The fact that Cicero is not simply a neutral historian of philosophy, but rather affiliated with, and trying to prove his importance within, a specific philosophical institution also means that on a philosophical level there remains a significant distance between him and Isocrates.

It has been noticed in scholarship before that Isocrates’ importance, however great it may have been for his earlier approach to rhetoric and philosophy, seems to decrease in Cicero’s later works as he becomes more and more involved with institutionalized philosophy.⁷⁹ And indeed, when it comes to identifying his prime influences, Cicero says in the Orator, one of his last works dedicated to rhetoric from 46 bce: ‘I confess that whatever ability I possess as an orator comes, not from the workshops of the rhetoricians, but from the spacious grounds of the Academy. Here indeed is the field for manifold and varied debate, which was first trodden by the feet of Plato’ (12: fateor me oratorem, si modo sim aut etiam quicumque sim, non ex rhetorum officinis, sed ex Academiae spatiis exstitisse. Illa enim sunt curricula multiplicium variorumque sermonum, in quibus Platonis primum sunt impressa vestigia). Despite the important position of Demosthenes and Isocrates in this work,⁸⁰ Cicero makes it clear from the beginning that his biggest debt and intellectual affiliation remains to the Academic school. As Cicero’s own admission shows, his appreciation for Isocrates requires most defense among his fellow intellectuals (Or. 40). As a stylist, Isocrates’ works are not appropriate for public performance; as a philosopher he remains outside all existing respectable schools and is not part of the philosophical canon proper. To bolster his own confidence in relying on Isocrates for inspiration for rhetorical education and – in particular – for the idea of writing, Cicero turns to an undoubted authority: Plato’s Phaedrus.⁸¹ Cicero quotes the last sections of Plato’s dialogue (from 279a), where Socrates utters the famous prophecy that Isocrates will aspire, once he grows up, to greater things (than the Lysianic rhetoric), ‘for nature has implanted philosophy in the man’s mind’ (41: inest enim natura philosophia in huius viri mente quaedam).⁸² Cicero claims to be following Socrates and Plato in having a high regard for Isocrates and he argues that while the epideictic rhetoric (epidicticum genus), which Isocrates is presumably taken to represent, is not appropriate in real-life rhetoric (42), it is an important step in rhetorical education, because ‘eloquence receives nourishment from this until it later takes on color and strength by itself’ (42: sed quod educat huius nutrimentis eloquentia ipsa se postea colorat et roborat; cf. 37–8). Hence, while Isocrates is not to be followed and emulated by fully developed orators or statesmen, he remains an important cornerstone and signifies a particular stage in the rhetorical-philosophical education.

There is also the political dimension. Cicero might have found Isocrates, among others, an interesting model for the ‘deep’ political layer of rhetoric and oratory. Since Isocrates was himself not active as a politician, but makes it clear through his works that he exercised significant impact on Athenian politics through his teaching and discourses, he remains a fascinating example for anyone struggling to assert themselves overtly in a public and political context. Isocrates’ political encomia of princes and men of power might have been particularly instructive in this context.⁸³ Indeed, the proximity to power that this kind of writing suggests might have been particularly seductive to Cicero when banned from active political life and confined to observing and commenting on contemporary politics without being able to intervene in any other way than through his writings.⁸⁴ However, since Cicero does not explicitly talk about Isocrates’ influences on the political considerations of his career, these observations – though attractive – are bound to remain speculative. In the end, the overwhelming sense we get from Cicero is that despite the wide appeal and attraction of Isocrates, he was strongly enough opposed among Cicero’s intellectual circle as a legitimate predecessor and inspiration, that Cicero (in his careful progress in philosophical circles) did not feel confident enough to take upon himself a defense of Isocrates.

What we see, in sum, from the two important critics of the earlier part of first-century bce Rome is that Isocrates continued to be talked about among critics and philosophers of rhetoric. Both Cicero and Philodemus speak of Isocrates in positive terms and react against critics who think either too little or too much of the rhetorician. In framing their respective views on Isocrates, they both refer back (Cicero explicitly and Philodemus implicitly) to Plato’s assessment of Isocrates in comparison with Lysias: Isocrates has potential for philosophy though he is not there yet. As we will see below, the Atticist movement will re-evaluate the debate about classical rhetoric and the role of Isocrates and Lysias in it. While Lysias will gain dominance for the first time after a long period of dormancy, Isocrates continues to be championed as providing a crucial theoretical axis for the interpretation and application of Greek rhetoric.

Philodemus and Cicero on Lysias

While Isocrates looms large in Philodemus’ discussion of rhetoric and education, Lysias occupies by contrast a negligible position in the Rhetoric. He is mentioned only once (Sudhaus ii.122.3) alongside Gorgias and Isocrates, where Philodemus argues that all these three have a method or possess an ‘art’ in writing.⁸⁵ Philodemus’ choice of the three is intriguing, but given that the overall context of the passage is sophistic rhetoric, it is very plausible that Lysias figures in the list for his funeral oration.⁸⁶ Lysias did not merit more attention as a representative of sophistic rhetoric, because other than the funeral oration he was associated neither with epideictic speeches nor with teaching or education more generally. He was a representative of courtroom oratory and, as such, not relevant for Philodemus’ discussion of rhetoric as an art. The lack of further references to Lysias in Philodemus’ work suggests not only that Lysias (contrary to Isocrates) was not a particularly relevant writer for Philodemus, but also that he was not prominent within the critical circle at the time when Philodemus was writing.⁸⁷ As a forensic or political writer, Philodemus clearly preferred Demosthenes, who was characterized as the true proponent of political rhetoric, a rhetoric that is not an art (τέχνη) and thus not teachable. Erbì has argued that the image of Demosthenes was consciously shaped by the Epicureans to fit their idea of the ῥήτωρ ἔμπρακτος.⁸⁸ This concept was probably developed in a polemical confrontation with the Peripatetics, who had long attempted to discredit Demosthenes and downplay his skills as an excellent orator.⁸⁹ Since ultimately the Epicureans were not interested in political speeches and they seem to pay attention to Isocrates as a representative of sophistic rhetoric only in so far as it is an art that might be relevant for philosophy, it also explains well why they would discard Lysias for having been relevant to neither the practical nor the theoretical domain of rhetoric that they were interested in.

Neither is Lysias a prominent figure in Cicero, at least not before the Atticist polemic explodes in critical circles sometime in the earlier part of the first century bce.⁹⁰ The Atticist movement seems therefore to constitute a clear shift in the reception of Lysias. Indeed, from that moment onwards Lysias becomes once again the representative of style and of a kind of rhetoric that is concerned with (simple) style and persuasion.

Cicero might have imitated Lysias’ speeches in his own early work, but due to the large number of Lysianic fragments and speeches that were probably available to Cicero, it would be in any case impossible to determine more precisely where and how Lysias was emulated.⁹¹ Cicero’s later appreciation for Lysias is directly related to the trends of contemporary literary criticism and especially to the rise of the Atticists who had apparently condemned Cicero’s elaborate prose, comparing it with the simple Lysianic style that reigned supreme in these circles. This provoked Cicero’s response, and his discussion of Lysias in the Brutus and Orator, works which are our primary sources for the Atticist criticism, is rather polemical. Cicero is quick to praise Lysias’ style, but his expressed admiration is often followed by comments or comparisons which hinder Lysias’ emergence as a single and unique representative of the Attic style. In the Brutus, for example, Lysias is acclaimed as a ‘writer of extraordinary refinement and elegance, whom you might almost venture to call a perfect orator’ (35: egregie subtilis scriptor atque elegans, quem iam prope audeas oratorem perfectum dicere), only to be reminded in the next sentence that ‘the perfect orator and the one who lacks absolutely nothing you would without hesitation name Demosthenes’ (nam plane quidem perfectum et quoi nihil admodum desit Demosthenem facile dixeris).⁹² This passage, which continues to point out Lysias’ excellent qualities, shows also Cicero’s own fine compositional skill and boasts a highly rhetorical sentence structure, full of double negatives (e.g. nihil acute inveniri potuit […] quod ille non viderit, etc.).

Perhaps the most striking analysis of Lysias’ writing style follows his comparison with Cato (Brutus 63–4), where Lysias’ style is described by reference to the human body: Cicero establishes first that Lysias, like Cato, is sharp (acutus), fine (elegans), witty (facetus) and brief (brevis), and then turns to his followers who ‘cultivate a lean rather than a copious habit of body’ (qui non tam habitus corporis opimos quam gracilitates consectentur), and admire slenderness (tenuitas ipsa delectat). Lysias’ style as a whole is more of a meagre type (verum est certe genere toto strigosior) and his admirers delight in this slightness (qui hac ipsa eius subtilitate admodum gaudeant).⁹³ This develops and adds another layer to the ancient reception, starting from Plato’s Phaedrus, of Lysias’ writings as witty, simple and persuasive.⁹⁴ It is plausible that in this description Cicero’s attitude to Lysias is somewhat preconditioned by the proximity of this language of Lysianic smallness and slenderness with Hellenistic literature and its emphasis on the small and fine (λεπτός) – attributes of the Callimachean poetics that Cicero viewed with contempt.⁹⁵

Cicero makes two further interesting comparisons that are worth spelling out in this context. In the Brutus, Cicero points out that Lysias started out his career with (theoretical) writings on rhetoric (48: Lysiam primo profiteri solitum artem esse dicendi), but upon realizing the superiority of Theodorus, he abandoned the art (artem removisse). Cicero says he is relying in his report on Aristotle, but it must have been one of his lost works, for we do not find any such statements in Aristotle’s existing corpus.⁹⁶ Either way, Cicero’s reliance on Aristotle shows that the latter also seems to have corroborated the view (analyzed in Chapter 1) of Lysias as an ‘anti-theorist’ or as someone inept for abstract or theoretical thought. He makes another illuminating comparison in his Orator. when discussing the role of humor in oratory, Cicero concedes that ‘whatever is witty and wholesome in speech is peculiar to the Athenian orators’ (90: quoniam quicquid est salsum aut salubre in oration id proprium Atticorum est) and plays the Greek orators against each other according to this characteristic. Lysias is mentioned first as having enough of wittiness, Hyperides is judged to be equal to Lysias, but Demades as having excelled them all. Demosthenes ‘is not witty so much as humorous’ (non tam dicax fuit quam facetus). Cicero explains: being witty requires sharper talent (acrioris ingeni), being humorous ‘greater art’ (maioris artis). This statement places Cicero at the center of the φύσις/τέχνη debate that Peripatetics and Epicureans were having about the orators and Demosthenes in particular. Cicero associates Demosthenes with, and appreciates him for, the rhetorical τέχνη (contra Epicureans), while Lysias is evoked as an example of talent and admired both by the Atticists and Cicero for his wit. The previous discussion on Philodemus indicated exactly the reverse: Lysias (and his funeral oration in particular) was an example of art, whereas Demosthenes was an example of talent and experience. What does that mean? Besides making comments about Attic orators, these passages also indicate that the tradition of rhetoric and its classical representatives were all conceived as useful political tools that were now being reinterpreted and used by critics and philosophers for their own different agendas. Rhetoric had thus far not developed a stabilized and solid tradition that would have fixated the interpretation of the orators in a specific framework. Indeed, Plato’s Phaedrus had thus far offered some thoughts about how to think about orators and speechwriters, but the first-century bce critics and philosophers were now eagerly starting to create that missing theoretical axis for rhetorical education that would incorporate orators and teachers of rhetoric that had become so meaningful for the subsequent constructions of Greek identity and culture.

It is clear that in the Roman context, too, more is at stake than simply the right kind of style. It is about cultural capital. When Cicero turns to discuss the Atticists’ preferences, his tone is particularly critical, even if his admiration for Lysias is the more straightforward. In his Brutus Cicero accuses the Atticists of having willfully chosen one example, Lysias, from a variety of different and equally illustrious examples of Attic eloquence. According to Cicero, these Atticists regard meagreness, dryness and general poverty, provided it has polish, urbanity and fineness, as the characteristics of Attic style (285). Yet there are more examples of Attic writing than simply Lysias. In the Orator, Cicero argues that the Atticists champion the man who ‘speaks in rough and unpolished style, provided only that he does so elegantly (eleganter) and plainly (enucleate)’ (28). He questions again their grounds for considering this style the only one appropriately labeled as Attic. Cicero turns to Lysias and agrees that ‘the Attic manner of speech belonged to Lysias, that most charming (venustissimus) and exquisite (politissimus) writer (who could deny it?)’ (29), but adds that Lysias should not be praised for his plain and unadorned style, but rather for the fact that ‘he has nothing strange (insolens) or wanting in taste (ineptus)’. This is clever and exemplifies well Cicero’s general aim to demonstrate that the Atticists have not sufficiently understood their own principles and models that they advocate.

Plato’s Phaedrus is explicitly present in Cicero’s thinking through the rhetorical canon and his own relationship to the orators. Within the context of the Atticist controversy and having to defend his own writing, Cicero must have particularly enjoyed invoking the passage from Plato’s Phaedrus, which compares Isocrates with Lysias. Despite its explicit aim to champion Isocrates as an important figure for rhetorical teaching,⁹⁷ we might perhaps notice a victorious undertone in Cicero’s translation of the Phaedrus (Orator 41: ‘He seems to me to possess greater talent than to be judged by the standard of Lysias’ speeches’; [Isocrates] maiore mihi ingenio videtur esse quam ut cum orationibus Lysiae comparetur), which enables him to appeal to Plato as an authority for his praise of Isocrates and, implicitly, for his lower regard of Lysias. It also seems to work particularly well for Cicero that Lysias, the model for plain Attic style, had apparently also been an inspiration for Hegesias of Magnesia, the ‘chief’ representative of the Asianist style, who was deeply despised by the Atticists. Cicero does not miss the opportunity to point this out in his Orator (226), as if to suggest that following one extreme (the Lysianic plain style) might inevitably lead to advocating the other extreme (the Asianist style). Cicero indicates, therefore, that Lysias was a rather more nuanced representative of rhetoric and with the authority of Plato (and Plato’s Phaedrus in particular) he implicitly indicates some possible issues in Lysias’ thought that may be relevant for those who are completely taken by the writer.

As we saw also in the case of Isocrates, Plato’s Phaedrus offers itself as a crucial authoritative text for conceptualizing ancient Greek rhetoric and negotiating the position of its participants (Lysias and Isocrates) for a contemporary audience. Despite the messiness of the tradition, as long as philosophers and critics are drawing on this influential dialogue, we are never too far from constructing a view of rhetoric through the two opposing sides: the Lysianic and the Isocratean. While Isocrates seems to have had a strong hold in education and rhetoric from the fourth century bce onwards, he was certainly not a mainstream philosopher and, as such, his views on philosophy and rhetoric did not gain currency in the tradition of Greek philosophy that was transmitted primarily through various philosophical schools. Lysias on the other hand seems to have been preserved in the fringes of rhetorical tradition largely due to his epideictic speech (funeral oration) and his presence in Plato’s Phaedrus. In other words, by the time we come to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the larger framework of the rhetorical tradition is heavily drawing on that Platonic dialogue, even if the specific roles of Lysias and Isocrates in it are not always conceptually clear or well understood.