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Works Gorgias (380 BC) Phaedrus (c. 370 BC) Rhetoric (c. 350 BC) Rhetoric to Alexander (c. 350 BC) De Sophisticis Elenchis (c. 350 BC) Topics (c. 350 BC) De Inventione (84 BC) Rhetorica ad Herennium (80 BC) De Oratore (55 BC) A Dialogue Concerning Oratorical Partitions (c. 50 BC) De Optimo Genere Oratorum (46 BC) Orator (46 BC) On the Sublime (c. 50) Institutio Oratoria (95) Panegyrici Latini (100–400) Dialogus de oratoribus (102) De doctrina Christiana (426) De vulgari eloquentia (1305) Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (1521) Language as Symbolic Action (1966) A General Rhetoric (1970)
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v t e

In classical rhetoric, the Common Topics were a short list of four traditional topics regarded as suitable to structure an argument.

1. Past Fact (Circumstance)
2. Possible/Impossible (Possibility)
3. Future Fact (Circumstance)
4. Greater/Lesser (Comparison)

Edward P.J. Corbett and Robert J. Connors expanded the list in their 1971 book Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student to include:

• Definition
  • genus / division / species
  • etymology
  • description
  • definition
  • example
  • synonyms
• Comparison
  • similarity
  • difference
  • degree
• Circumstance
  • cause and effect
  • timing
• Relationship
  • contraries
  • exclusion
  • open
  • closed
  • complicated
  • sexual
  • casual

• Testimony
  • statistics
  • maxims
  • law
  • precedents
  • personal example
  • historical example
  • authoritative quotes

• Rhetoric (Aristotle)

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