The rhetoric of litigiousness and legal expertise in Cicero and the Attic orators

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dc.contributor.advisorGagarin, Michael
dc.contributor.advisorRiggsby, Andrew M.
dc.creatorde Brauw, Michael Christopheren
dc.date.accessioned2015-05-13T15:26:36Zen
dc.date.accessioned2018-01-22T22:27:47Z
dc.date.available2015-05-13T15:26:36Zen
dc.date.available2018-01-22T22:27:47Z
dc.date.issued2003-08en
dc.descriptiontexten
dc.description.abstractTraditional accounts of ancient law make the following generalizations: Athenian law was a system of amateurs and, consequently, arbitrary and irrational. Roman law, by contrast, gradually became a system of specialized professionals. Legal scholars (jurists) interpreted and developed the law and advocates represented litigants. Thanks to specialization, Roman law became rational and consistent--a foundation for Rome's imperial administration as well as many modern legal systems. Bruce Frier has argued in a landmark book that this development ("the rise of the Roman jurists") began in the last century of the republic, and that it was endorsed by Cicero. By examining how Cicero and the Attic orators discuss legal expertise and litigation, I seek to revise this standard picture in two ways. First, I argue that Athenians were not hostile to legal knowledge per se, but to expertise in litigation. I find, furthermore, that learning from the laws was part of the moral training of Athenian citizens. I then argue that Cicero's attitude towards legal expertise was not progressive, but reactionary. Litigation was a moral issue in the Roman republic no less than in democratic Athens. In Cicero's opinion, the true legal expert--whether an orator, a jurist, or a statesman--is a figure with the moral authority to resolve conflicts without debate. Cicero promulgates an ideology of law wherein litigation ideally would be unnecessary, and citizens' disputes would be resolved by their "natural" superiors.en
dc.description.departmentClassicsen
dc.format.mediumelectronicen
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2152/29811en
dc.language.isoengen
dc.rightsCopyright is held by the author. Presentation of this material on the Libraries' web site by University Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin was made possible under a limited license grant from the author who has retained all copyrights in the works.en
dc.rights.restrictionRestricteden
dc.subjectAttic oratoren
dc.subjectRoman law--Antiquitiesen
dc.subjectCicero, Marcus Tulliusen
dc.subjectLaw--Greece--Antiquitiesen
dc.subjectLaw--Greece--Athensen
dc.subjectAthens (Greece)--Antiquities,Romanen
dc.titleThe rhetoric of litigiousness and legal expertise in Cicero and the Attic oratorsen
dc.typeThesisen

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