rhetoricus

Forms

rhētoricus (feminine rhētorica, neuter rhētoricum, comparative rhētoricōteros); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek ῥητορικός (rhētorikós, “oratorical, rhetorical”),^[2][3][1] from ῥήτωρ (rhḗtōr, “public speaker, orator”).^[1][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Ennius already has the neuter plural rhetorica, teachings on rhetoric.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Cicero used it of whatever belongs to the art of speaking: teachers of rhetoric, rhetorical exercises, and ars rhetorica or simply rhetorica for the art itself.^[2][5][6] Quintilian called Cicero's De inventione his rhetorici, “books on rhetoric”.^[2] It could also mean belonging to a teacher of rhetoric, as when Juvenal speaks of one who comes down to real fighting from the shade of the rhetorician's school.^[2] In medieval Latin it was also a noun for an orator or learned man,^[4] and English drew rhetorical from it, or from the noun rhetoric, in the mid-15th century.^[7]

Timeline

• 204–169 BC – Ennius uses rhetorica for teachings on rhetoric.^[2]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero speaks of rhetorici doctores and of ars rhetorica.^[2][5][4]
• c. 35–95/96 AD – Quintilian calls Cicero's De inventione his rhetorici.^[2][4]
• c. 67–c. 127 AD – Juvenal uses it of a teacher of rhetoric.^[2][4]
• mid-15th century – English forms rhetorical from it or from the noun rhetoric.^[7]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of or relating to public speaking, rhetorical.^[2][5]
2. (feminine as noun, also ars rhetorica) The art of rhetoric.^[2]
3. (masculine plural as noun) Books on rhetoric;^[2] Quintilian's name for Cicero's De inventione.^[2]
4. (neuter plural as noun) Teachings on rhetoric.^[2]
5. Of or belonging to a teacher of rhetoric.^[2][6]

Noun

1. (Medieval Latin) An orator, a learned man.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
4. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com