Presbeutikoi and Enteuktikoi Logoi in Hellenistic Interstate Relations: Some Further Thoughts from an Epigraphical Perspective (c. 306-205 B.C.)

The increasing importance of diplomatic interactions in the Hellenistic world led some historians and rhetoricians to expand and manipulate Aristotle’s tripartition of the genera dicendi so as to include the ambassadorial address. Building primarily on epigraphic evidence, which, despite being instrumental in reconstructing the development of ancient Greek diplomacy, has been largely neglected, this paper aims to contribute to a better understanding of the characteristics of ambassadorial rhetoric in the third century BC by examining some inscriptions that preserve summaries of (or comment on) the envoys’ oral presentations before their audiences.