ABSTRACT
Concerning the works contributed by Cicero to rhetorical study something must first be said; and to begin with, it is not without its significance that his earliest effort took the form of a treatise on rhetoric, written while its author was still a pupil of Molon and Diodotus. It is a history of oratory in dialogue form, reminiscent of the Aristotelian type; Cicero, the main speaker, is visited in his garden at Rome by Atdcus and Brutus, and is induced to attempt an account of earlier orators and their performances. From what has so far been said of Cicero's three chief works on rhetoric it is obvious at once that here we have something quite different from earlier treatises, something other than those scholastic rhetorics of which Ad Herennium was a notable example.
