A Ars Rhetorica renascentista: o humanismo em apologia a Studia Litterarum

Abstract

The article aims to investigate the hypothesis of the centrality of ars rhetorica and philology as the foundations of the studia humanitatis in the Italian Renaissance, as a guiding thread for understanding the humanistic movement of the period. The analysis highlights the critical revival of classical texts, especially Ciceronian ones, as the basis for reconstructing a moral, political, and educational language oriented toward the vita activa. Humanism is interpreted not merely as a philological or aesthetic movement, but as a pedagogical and civic project directed toward the formation of the homo eloquens and the preservation of the res publica. Classical imitation (imitatio) is seen as an epistemological and ethical strategy, oriented toward concrete action. The articulation between eloquence, ethics, and politics marks the singularity of Renaissance humanism in  contrast to the medieval legacy, effecting an epistemological rupture grounded in language as both the form and the content of public life.