Dionysius of Halicarnassus (c.60 - 7 BC)
Dionysius of Halicarnassus (60/55 - 7 BC) was a Greek teacher of rhetoric and a distinguished literary critic, who mixed in with Rome's upper crust after the civil wars which created the Roman Empire.
He wrote on many topics and also wrote his Roman Antiquities in twenty books, a history of Rome from the legendary beginnings to 264 BC. Books I-X and most of XI still exist, with fragments of the rest. He also wrote On the Arrangement of Words, On Imitation, On the Early Orators, On Thucydides, and On the Eloquence of Demosthenes.
A work entitled The Art of Rhetoric is associated with his name but may actually have been written later. Very rhetorical and prone to inserting dubious speeches, his works are still a valid and valuable source. "History is philosophy learned from examples."
Did you know...
Dionysius of Halicarnassus' chief object was to reconcile the Greeks to the rule of Rome.
