The Chreia and Ancient Rhetoric: Classroom Exercises (Writings from the Greco-roman World)

Reading, writing an inflected language, and composing an argument were among the skills taught in Greco-Roman schools. At all three curricular levels students developed these skills by learning how to use a literary form known as the chreia, or anecdote. Beginners at the primary level learned to read and write by copying different examples of the chreia. Students at the secondary level used it to learn how to decline nouns and conjugate verbs and form them into grammatically correct sentences. Advanced students learned how to elaborate a simple chreia into an eight-paragraph essay that argued for the truth of whatever saying or action was celebrated in the chreia. This volume incorporates thirty-six texts, most translated for the first time, that illustrate the use of the chreia at all three levels, a use that can be documented from the first century on through late antiquity and the Byzantine world. It demonstrates that people with all levels of education were intimately familiar with this important literary form, which not only preserves the wit and wisdom of famous philosophers, orators, kings, and poets but also explains its pervasive and enduring use in ancient literature. In this second of three volumes designed to present all the educational texts regarding the literary form chreia, the focus is on the tertiary, specifically the rhetorical stage of education, though two initial chapters review its teaching at the first two levels. The texts are presented on facing pages of Greek and English; each text or group of texts is introduced. The Society of Biblical Literature publishes the book and distributes the paperbound edition; Brill distributes the clothbound edition. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR Frontmatter Preface (page ix) Abbreviations (page xiii) Chapter 1. Reading and Copying the Chreia: The Uses of the Chreia in the Primary Curriculum Chapter 2. Declining the Chreia: The Use of the Chreia in the Secondary Curriculum Chapter 3. Elaborating the Chreia: The Use of the Chreia in the Rhetorical Cirriculum Bibliography (page 361) Index of Greek Words (page 375)