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Quintilian (Marcus Fabius Quintilianus) : Cicero Aristotle

Quintilian was a Roman orator and writer on rhetoric who lived from 30-35 CE to after 94 CE in Rome. He received recognition for his skill as a teacher of rhetoric and was granted a regular income from the imperial treasury, a first for his profession. Quintilian is best known for his work Institutio Oratoria, a 12-book treatise on the ideal training of an orator from childhood to maturity. In this work, his references to music show a wide reading on the topic but not a deep technical knowledge of music. He viewed music as important for boys to study before rhetoric but saw it as subordinate to and a tool for rhetoric. Though he acknowledged music's ethical power, he ultimately

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51 views

Quintilian (Marcus Fabius Quintilianus) : Cicero Aristotle

Quintilian was a Roman orator and writer on rhetoric who lived from 30-35 CE to after 94 CE in Rome. He received recognition for his skill as a teacher of rhetoric and was granted a regular income from the imperial treasury, a first for his profession. Quintilian is best known for his work Institutio Oratoria, a 12-book treatise on the ideal training of an orator from childhood to maturity. In this work, his references to music show a wide reading on the topic but not a deep technical knowledge of music. He viewed music as important for boys to study before rhetoric but saw it as subordinate to and a tool for rhetoric. Though he acknowledged music's ethical power, he ultimately

Uploaded by

Sergio Miguel Miguel
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Quintilian [Marcus Fabius

Quintilianus]
(b Calagurris, Spain, 30–35 ce; d Rome, after c94
ce). Roman orator and writer on rhetoric. He may have begun
his studies in Spain; he completed them at Rome and there
went on to gain both fame and wealth. In recognition of his
remarkable skill at teaching rhetoric, he received a regular
income from the imperial treasury, the first of his profession to
be granted this honour. The literary testimonial to his gifts is
the Institutio oratoria (completed c95 ce), a treatise in 12
books on the training of the ideal orator from earliest
childhood to maturity. In this one surviving work the
references to music form an unusual commentary, since they
are based on wide reading and sympathetic interest rather
than deep knowledge.
The recognition of a relationship between music and rhetoric
goes back to earlier Roman writers such as Cicero, and
beyond them to Aristotle himself. Quintilian, accordingly, felt
himself to be on firm ground. He did not hesitate to include
music, admittedly as a counsel of perfection, among the arts
which boys should study before beginning rhetoric (i.10.1–4).
The extended eulogy of music that follows (i.10.9–33) seeks
to demonstrate its antiquity, importance and power through a
large number of examples, most of them familiar. The
latinized term musice used here includes dancing but
otherwise conveys much the same meaning as ‘music’ in
modern usage; there is nothing of the broad sense (practically
‘culture’) that mousikē had for Hellenic writers.
Quintilian seldom mentioned details of instrumental technique
or construction. The occasional references bespeak close
observation of external details, as in the account of a
kitharode's movements (i.12.3) with its rare evidence for
deadening the strings of the lyre. At such times, however,
understanding may go no further than the comprehension of
outward appearances or elementary facts of performance.
Thus a maladroit lyre player supposedly might find it
necessary to ‘take the measure’ of individual strings
(demensis singulis, v.10.124) in order to match them with
vocal pitches – an apparently meaningless supposition. Also
found is the unsupported statement that musicians
considered the lyre to have five basic notes (xii.10.68).
Although he reserved the term ‘ethos’ for a wholly non-
musical context (vi.2.18–20), Quintilian clearly assented to a
doctrine of musical ethos. He even stated his wish to possess
a knowledge of its fundamental principles (cognitionem
rationis, i.10.31). A spirited passage (ix.4.10–13) deals with
Man's natural affinity for musical sounds and devotes special
attention to the tacita vis, the secret power of rhythm and
melody that gives instrumental music affective power even
apart from the voice (so also i.10.25; cf xi.3.66, on dancing).
Quintilian nevertheless considered it a power that reaches the
height of effectiveness in rhetorical eloquence, not in musical
performance.
This assessment seems typical. Music has almost no
importance in the Institutio oratoria save as a propaideutic.
Despite express adherence to a belief in musical ethos,
Quintilian showed an overriding concern with the spoken word
when he dealt with ethical problems. Unquestionably an
advocate of musice, he viewed it as the handmaiden
of rhetorice, and his comments reveal a limited understanding
of its secrets.
Quintilian's Institutio oratoria was known (generally in
incomplete form) but not much favoured in the Middle Ages.
Renaissance humanism, however, responded to its central
tenet that the purpose of a rhetorical education was to
produce a man of good character and cultivation. The treatise
was known to Petrarch (1304–74) only in an imperfect form,
but in 1416 Poggio Bracciolini (1380–1459) discovered a
complete copy at St Gallen. First printed in 1470, the treatise
was widely and generally read, becoming highly influential in
the music theory of the 16th–18th centuries.
WRITINGS
H.E. Butler, ed. and trans.: The Institutio oratoria of
Quintilian (London and Cambridge, MA, 1920–22/R)
M. Winterbottom, ed.: M. Fabi Quintiliani Institutionis
oratoriae libri duodecim (Oxford, 1970/R)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
G.W. Pietzsch: Die Musik im Erziehungs- und Bildungsideal
des ausgehenden Altertums und frühen
Mittelalters (Halle, 1932/R), 5ff
J. Cousin: Etudes sur Quintilien (Paris, 1936/R)
G. Wille: Musica romana (Amsterdam, 1967), esp. 449ff
U. Müller: ‘Zur musikalischen Terminologie der antiken
Rhetorik: Ausdrücke für Stimmanlage und
Stimmgebrauch bei Quintilian, Institutio oratoria,
11,3’, AMw, xxvi (1969), 29–48, 105–24
G. Wille: Einführung in das römische
Musikleben (Darmstadt, 1977), 166–71
B.M. Wilson: ‘Ut oratoria musica in the Writings of
Renaissance Music Theorists’, Festa musicologica:
Essays in Honor of George J. Buelow, ed. T.J. Mathiesen
and B. Rivera (Stuyvesant, NY, 1995), 341–68

For further bibliography see Rome, §I.

WARREN ANDERSON/THOMAS J. MATHIESEN

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