Apollodorus ( grc, Ἀπολλόδωρος) of
Pergamon
Pergamon or Pergamum ( or ; grc-gre, Πέργαμον), also referred to by its modern Greek form Pergamos (), was a rich and powerful ancient Greek city in Mysia. It is located from the modern coastline of the Aegean Sea on a promontory on th ...
was a
rhetorician of
ancient Greece
Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of Classical Antiquity, classical antiquity ( AD 600), th ...
who was the author of a school of rhetoric called after him ''Apollodoreios Hairesis'' (Ἀπολλοδωρειος αἵρεσις), which was subsequently opposed by the school established by
Theodorus of Gadara
Theodorus of Gadara ( el, Θεόδωρος ὁ Γαδαρεύς) was a Greek rhetorician of the 1st century BC from Gadara (present-day Um Qais, Jordan)Blank, David"Philodemus" The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2019 Edition), Edward ...
(Θεοδώρειος αἵρεσις).
In his advanced age Apollodorus taught rhetoric at
Apollonia, and here the young future Roman emperor
Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...
was one of his pupils and became his friend. The geographer
Strabo ascribes to him scientific works (τέχνας) on rhetoric, but
Quintilian on the authority of Apollodorus himself declares only one of the works ascribed to him as genuine, and this he calls ''Ars'' (τέχνη) ''edita ad Matium'', in which the author treated on oratory only insofar as speaking in the courts of justice was concerned.
Apollodorus himself wrote little, and his whole theory could be gathered only from the works of his disciples,
Gaius Valgius and
Atticus.
Lucian states that Apollodorus died at the age of eighty-two.
[C. W. Piderit, ''de Apollodoro Perqameno et Theodoro Gadarensi, Rhetoribus.'' Marburg, 4to]
Notes
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People from Pergamon
1st-century BC Greek people
Ancient Greek rhetoricians
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