Cicero's brief rhetorical dialogue Partitiones oratoriae has hitherto been largely neglected by scholars. Unjustly so, maintains Arweiler, who analyses the text as an independent textbook of rhetoric. He conducts his interpretation with constant reference to Cicero’s great rhetorical works (primarilyDe oratore) and philosophical writings.

Thus, rhetoric gives power over opponents in disputes, and consequently over political opponents. Against this background, the author shows how successfully Cicero projects himself in thePartitiones oratoriae as a 'scholar in politics'. In the eyes of his contemporaries, this dual function gave him a dominant role in Roman society and politics equal to that of Caesar, and it is no coincidence that Caesar dedicated his own linguistic publicationDe analogia to Cicero.

Alexander Arweiler teaches Classical Studies at the Christian-Albrechts-Universit of Kiel, Germany.