As Greek became the most important language of communication between the different parts of the Hellenistic world, instruction in the language became a necessity for those who had not known it previously. Since the rulers and administrations of the Successor kingdoms were, initially, Macedonians and Greeks, the ability to communicate with them in their own language and a familiarity with the concepts they would recognize became a political and civic necessity. Naturally, this was a new development primarily in areas that had recently come under Macedonian and Greek control, but the need to communicate effectively with their political masters was equally important in areas that had been Greek-speaking for centuries. At the same time, in order for elites of different regions to be able to communicate with each other, a common educational system began to develop. The goal was to inculcate, in new generations of students, a familiarity with paideia, often defined as the Greek heritage, including its moral, social and political values, and sometimes simply as Greek ‘culture’.
The importance of a shared paideia should not be under-estimated. Embassies to rulers, which could be instrumental in achieving favourable treatment on a variety of issues ranging from tax relief to assistance in other areas, were a regular feature of cities’ relationships with their political masters. Ambassadors, who often expressed their desires through speeches, would find it easier to communicate with rulers if both sides shared a heritage. Similarly, expressions of loyalty, regularly offered through orations, needed to be effective, for they could compose a ruler’s anger against a city whose loyalty had been questioned or initiate favourable treatment. To achieve this, training in the techniques of rhetoric provided invaluable assistance. At the same time, rulers had begun, as early as Alexander himself, to adopt positions in relation to their subjects that incorporated elements of a more eastern tradition of kingship, leading to ruler cults8 and a consequent need to define the relationship between governor and governed, in language that both parties could understand. Speeches based on a shared paideia could establish principles by drawing on the past, but would also remind rulers that they had responsibilities to the governed; indeed, orators could often, usually subtly, inform kings that loyalty depended to a considerable degree upon the fulfillment of the expectations of the governed.
Unfortunately, no speech written or delivered to a ruler in the Hellenistic period is extant.9 Since the approach survives into the Roman world, examples can be drawn from that period. Dio Chrysostom’s several speeches on kingship both praise the emperor Trajan as a model ruler and paint a picture of the model ruler for the emperor to emulate.10 Themistius in the fourth century AD does much the same thing: frequently, he praises a specific action of an emperor in order to extract further similar actions.11 In another vein, the existence of a loyalty dependent on performance emerges from close study of some Latin panegyrics delivered in the late third and early fourth centuries AD.12
All this had its foundation in the Hellenistic period. To accomplish these objectives, schools of rhetoric began to spring up all over the Greek-speaking Mediterranean world,13 as elites found it desirable to be able to communicate with their ruling powers in language the latter could understand and at the same time to be able to express themselves more effectively in achieving civic and personal goals. Naturally, instruction in the Greek language and literature was foundational to that study, and grammarians and their schools became a feature in most cities as well. In fact, we might say that grammarians taught the basic elements of Greek paideia, while teachers of rhetoric gave instruction in the techniques of employing it most effectively in those circumstances where it mattered.14
Naturally, schools had existed outside of Athens before the Hellenistic period, and some of these must have provided training in the art of speaking. That is evident simply from the origin of the sophists; Gorgias, for example, was from Leontini in Sicily, Prodicus from Ceos, and Hippias from Elis. From the very fact that their appearance at Athens created a stir, both positively and negatively, it is evident that the art of speaking was taught differently in different places, or at any rate differently outside Athens. In the long run, the interaction of the sophists with the schools of philosophy at Athens had a productive outcome, for it created a form of rhetorical training that would become universal in the Greek-speaking world during the Hellenistic period. In short, schools of rhetoric everywhere adopted the same approach to rhetorical training. This is equally true for schools that had existed for some time already and for new foundations in many more cities during the Hellenistic period. Though the dates for specific schools are not usually known, by the end of the Hellenistic period all major cities had schools where students could study rhetoric to a high level of competence, and many smaller towns could boast of schools where local boys might receive their first training in rhetoric, before travelling elsewhere for further study, if they or their families had the requisite resources and ambition. Though a family’s ambition for its sons might outstrip the financial and educational resources locally available, the universality of the educational process ensured that even these boys, and those from families with a more moderate ambition, received an education that put them in possession of a paideia that they shared with others whose circumstances were more fortunate. In their education at least, these boys could grow up to be the peers of their fellow-citizens within a town or a region or even the Greekspeaking world. In short, the proliferation of schools of rhetoric helped to create an elite with shared values that had not existed previously in so widespread an area of the Mediterranean world.
Inevitably, some schools - at Athens and Rhodes, for example - were regarded more highly than others and attracted the best teachers and the best students from all over the Greek-speaking world, but students elsewhere were taught the same basic principles in their classrooms, though, inevitably, teachers in different places put their individual stamps on their teaching methods. In the realm of theory, students learned about the different kinds of speeches; they studied aspects of style; they received instruction in the great variety of figures that could be employed for one kind of effect or another; they considered the nature of words themselves; they listened to their teachers discussing prose rhythm. Naturally, the teachers provided examples to illustrate theoretical issues. In the course of their education, schoolboys composed speeches, often on artificial themes, that instilled an ability to put their knowledge of rhetorical theory to practical use. As models, they analyzed, often memorized, the orations of the great orators of the past, primarily Lysias, Isocrates and Demosthenes.
They emulated them in their exercises in school, then attempted to model the speeches of their adult life on these orations.
Once boys who had been educated in rhetoric grew up to be men, they were ready for a role in the public life of their cities and towns. Depending on the level of their training and the availability of other candidates, they might be appointed to serve on an embassy to a ruler or to negotiate some point of contention with another town or to express gratitude to a benefactor. Visiting dignitaries, like rulers or their representatives and ambassadors from a neighbouring city, were generally welcomed with speeches delivered by a town’s most accomplished orator. Speeches were delivered at religious festivals and at other civic occasions. Somewhat more mundane, perhaps, but no less important for establishing influence and reputation, was election or appointment to a position of leadership within the community and a permanent place on the city council. In all these spheres of activity and more, the schools of rhetoric prepared boys for their adult life, in their own communities and outside them. Rather quickly, in fact, a rhetorical education became virtually a minimum requirement for full elite status. That is evident from the proliferation of schools of rhetoric, which trained far more students than the need for orators demanded: elite families simply could not permit their sons to be less impressively educated than their peers, who were, as well, often their rivals for influence in their communities.
World History
