A question of genre: Philip Melanchthon's oratorical debut at Wittenberg University

The speech Philip Melanchthon gave on 29 August 1518 at the University of Wittenberg to initiate his professorship is an impressive piece of humanist idealism. Already its title, De corrigendis adolescentiae studiis (On the reform of the studies for the young) reveals his earnest ambitions in introducing reform. Not incidentally, thus, the speech received a lot of attention immediately after its delivery and enjoyed a remarkable popularity even decades after. The speech marks, however, not only an interesting object of study in terms of its content but also in terms of its generic form. Usually labelled as a declamation, this study will revaluate this generic attribution, for the first time, by arguing that the declamation as an academic genre was only introduced into the German academic landscape after Melanchthon's debut in Wittenberg and that De corrigendis adolescentiae studiis does not convincingly fit the standards of declamatory speech in many other respects. It will be shown that the category more apt for talking about Melanchthon's speech is that of the inaugural oration – a genre yet highly underappreciated in modern research on early modern academic oratory.


INTRODUCTION
It is for three reasons that Philip Melanchthon's speech De corrigendis adolescentiae studiis (On the reform of the studies for the young; henceforth: DCAS) takes a special position among the hundreds of academic speeches Melanchthon produced for himself, for many of his students, and even for other high-profile scholars like Georg Major (1502-74), Georg Sabinus (1508-60) and David Chytraeus (1530-1600)1 : First, DCAS was only Melanchthon's second big speech to be printed (the first was his student oration De artibus liberalibus, held and printed in Tübingen in 1518).It was delivered as part of his being ceremonially sworn in as a professor of Greek at the University of Wittenberg in 1518.Second, DCAS is also of great importance as a speech that paradigmatically captures the spirit of humanism and makes it still palpable more than 500 years after its performance and print.The way Melanchthon promoted rhetoric in it, both as an academic discipline and as a means of education, decisively shaped the status of eloquence in the sixteenth century.While his handbooks De rhetorica libri tres (1519), Institutiones rhetoricae (1521)  and Elementa rhetorices (1531) contributed to the recognition of rhetoric in the learned world as well, surely there was no better way to address the issue than to do it 'in style' by means of a programmatic speech like DCAS.Third, DCAS serves as the first document of one of the major caesuras -if not the major caesura -in Melanchthon's life.His move to Wittenberg and acceptance of the professorship of Greek at the exact university which would soon become one of the centres of Reformation and humanism had a lasting effect on the course of his further career. 2DCAS was a programmatic starting point, heralding Melanchthon's later efforts as a humanist and reformer, as it were, in nuce.more recent classifications of rhetorical genre.The increasing refinement of different subgenres of academic oratory in the recent past (among others, we have come to differentiate between disputations, dissertations, prolusiones, praefationes, programmes, lectures, declamations and simple exercises), 5 necessitates a generic revaluation of DCAS to anchor this oration that is so often cited and so popularly known as a paradigmatic piece of German humanist culture in the right generic context.This article will move DCAS away from the declamatory format and tag it as a specific form of academic speech: an inaugural oration.
Using this categorization, scholars will be able to better understand individual arguments raised by Melanchthon in DCAS, their special placement in the text and their rhetorical finesse, as well as Melanchthon's ultimate purpose in voicing certain thoughts.After all, the inaugural oration -like any other academic speech -is characterized by a set of specific strategies tied to specific effects and aimed at specific outcomes.In addition, on a more general level, Melanchthon's oeuvre will be broadened by making visible a previously unrecognized oratorical genre like the inaugural oration among his writings.Finally, the examination of DCAS as an inaugural oration will also shed light on the inaugural oration as a genre of academic oratory.This genre has remained rather obscure so far, but seems to have been standardized at the German university from the sixteenth century onwards precisely due to outstanding examples like Melanchthon's DCAS, which other professors sought to imitate and emulate. 6 Knowledge, 5  (2021), 113-66; Meelis Friedenthal, Hanspeter Marti and Robert Seidel (eds.),Early Modern Disputations and Dissertations in an Interdisciplinary and European Context (Leiden: Brill, 2021). 6This assumption is put forward and substantiated by myself in a study currently prepared, comprehensively exploring the inaugural oration as a genre of academic oratory.Many details offered in chapter 3 of this article ("Inaugural Oration Instead of Declamation") are pre-tastes of this study.Frederick's favoured candidate for the chair of Greek was Johannes Reuchlin (1455-1522), who was considered the most accomplished German Greek scholar of his day.Reuchlin, however, felt he was too old for the job and too settled in life.He refused the offer from Wittenberg, recommending instead his former protégé (and great-nephew) from Heidelberg, the 21-year-old Philip Melanchthon (1497-1560).In his letter to Frederick III, dated 25 July 1518, Reuchlin showers Melanchthon with praise, rating him the second-best scholar after Erasmus: 'Dann ich wais unnder denn tütschen kainen, der über ine sy, ußgenommen hern Erasmus Roterodamus, der ist ain hollender; der selbig übertrifft unns all inn latyn'. 10-'For among the Germans I do not know anyone who would be better than him, with the single exception of the Dutchman Erasmus of Rotterdam, who surpasses us all in Latin'.Frederick trusted Reuchlin's recommendation and pushed the appointment of Melanchthon through, even though Luther would have 7 The preconditions leading up to the foundation of Wittenberg University are treated in Dieter Stievermann, 'Friedrich der Weise und seine Universität Wittenberg', in Sönke Lorenz (ed.), Attempto -oder wie stiftet man eine Universität: Die Universitätsgründungen der sogenannten zweiten Gründungswelle im Vergleich (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1999), 175-207.Details on the deliberate distancing from the medieval corporation -as indicated, for example, in the denomination academia (Vitebergensis) instead of the hitherto common universitas -are outlined in Willem Frijhoff, 'The European Landscape of Higher Education around 1500 and the Foundation of Marburg University', in Wolf-Friedrich Schäufele (ed.), Reformation der Kirche -Reform der Bildung: Die Universität Marburg und der reformatorische Bildungsauftrag (Münster: Waxmann, 2020), 67-81 (at 71 and 73).The most gracious and prudent Duke and Elector of Saxony, Frederick, nurtured the university he had founded and embellished it with erudite men whom he had assembled from everywhere.I heard that, among others, also Reuchlin, whose name at the time was on everybody's lips in all of Germany, had been called to come to Wittenberg.Yet he did not want to leave his home, where he then served as one of the three highest judges of the Swabian League.But in response to the offer he argued that there was someone far greater than himself: the young man Philip Melanchthon.And thus in 1518, Melanchthon was, by will of God and at the age of 21, summoned to Wittenberg by the elector to teach Greek.
Melanchthon followed the call and arrived in Wittenberg on 25 August 1518.Four days later, he delivered his speech DCAS in the All Saints' Church of Wittenberg.The audience is difficult to pinpoint exactly, but from the groups addressed by Melanchthon throughout his speech, it is safe to say that students, professors and other representatives of Wittenberg University, as well as local dignitaries, were present to gain a first impression of the new professor and hear him speak.Judging from the ensuing textual evidence, Melanchthon must not have disappointed; in fact, he must even have surprised.His rhetorical skills, his piercing arguments and the substance of his words earned him an immediate reputation as a learned man worthy of his office, despite the fact that his appearance initially led people to doubt that the 21-year-old was the right man for the job (he was of small and gawky stature, with a face like a boy, a thin voice and a speech impediment, probably a lisp or stutter). 13Even Martin Luther, who had been sitting in the auditorium, admitted to having wronged Melanchthon prior to his oratorical performance in a letter written to Georg Spalatin (1484-1545) two days after Melanchthon's speech (31 August 1518) 14 : [Melanchthon] habuit orationem quarto die postquam venerat, plane eruditissimam et tersissimam, tanta gratia omnium et admiratione, ut iam non id tibi cogitandum sit, qua ratione nobis eum commendes.Abstraximus cito opinionem et visionem staturae et personae et rem ipsam in eo et gratulamur.
He [Melanchthon] gave his inaugural oration on the fourth day upon his arrival, which was clearly most sophisticated and refined.It secured him the greatest favour and admiration from all people present, so that you no longer have to consider how to recommend him to us.We quickly laid aside our opinion and view of his stature and character and congratulate ourselves on such a professor.
But not only the primary listening audience paid tribute to Melanchthon.As soon as the speech was printed for the first time in October 1518 in Wittenberg, Melanchthon also rose to international fame.None less than the prince of the res publica literaria, Erasmus himself, congratulated him on his speech's success in a letter, dated 24 April 1519. 15Melanchthon's success would last with many reprints following in the next decades.By 1550, DCAS had been reprinted at least nine times, mostly in collected publications with renowned printers such as Johann Froben in Basel (1519) and Robert Estienne in Paris (1527, 1534, 1537). 16This frequency of reprint was remarkable for what was essentially an academic occasional speech, of which there were literally tens of thousands in the early modern period. 17art of the reason for the long-term impact of DCAS was the humanist mission statement it contained.With DCAS, Melanchthon ardently argued for the studia humanitatis and the liberal arts' complete dissociation from any scholastic conventions.The educational programme he unveils rests on the learning of grammar, dialectic and especially rhetoric by means of the  21 The vast majority of extant texts in this genre were authored by professors, who gave an inaugural oration as part of their official welcome to a university.
This was precisely the case with Melanchthon when he held DCAS on his arrival in Wittenberg and before he took up his office as professor of Greek.In contrast to today's rather ornamental function of professorial inaugural speeches, the early modern inaugural oration constituted an obligatory part of a professor's appointment (also at Wittenberg University).Most university statutes enshrined the delivery of an oration as a prerequisite for a professor to hold classes, receive his salary and gain the privileges of the faculty and the institution joined. 22Since Latin served as the official language of early modern academia, inaugural orations from the period between roughly 1450 and 1800 were held in Latin exclusively.
To date, the inaugural oration has not attracted too much attention among either Neo-Latinists or historians of the university.As a key element of the installation of a newly appointed professor, on the one hand, and a specific rite of passage in the series of ritualized transitions pertinent to a committed academic life (e.g., baccalaureate, magisterium, doctorate, holding of an academic office), on the other, it remains overlooked. 23urthermore, the definition of this genre in what is considered the standard reference work of rhetoric for the German-speaking world also remains unsatisfactorily vague and leaves the reader without any concrete ideas of the idiosyncrasies inherent in a professorial inaugural oration 24 : The term oratio inauguralis seems to have been derived from the office of the ancient Roman augurs who -apart from communicating with the divine -had to inaugurate priests, kings and temples and sometimes give a speech on the person or building inaugurated.None of those (or any other) inaugural orations, however, have come down to us from ancient Rome, where the inaugural oration was not even perceived as a specific genre of rhetoric (as is confirmed by the absence of mention in rhetorical theory).The inaugural oration as part of an academic ritual probably only emerged in the fifteenth century as a combination of official speeches given on the occasion of the investiture of high officials in the Byzantine Empire, acceptance speeches given by poet laureates in the tradition of Petrarch and ceremonial disputations given at either of the four university faculties.
Apart from the one or other random case study, a few uncommentedupon editions and two questionably conclusive works on vernacular inaugural orations from the nineteenth-and early twentieth-century German context,25 no truly informative, let alone comprehensive, study exists yet covering the early modern inaugural oration as a rhetorical genre.This is surprising considering that at least in the German Empire, the inaugural oration was among the most frequently printed academic genres next to dissertations, programmes, textbooks and course catalogues.Perhaps the lack of interest in the inaugural oration has been nurtured by the common prejudice that ceremonial oratory -also known as epideictic oratory -consists of a mere collection of repetitive patterns and rhetorical topoi, such as captationes benevolentiae, expressions of gratitude and praises of the university or a specific discipline.Maurizio Campanelli, for instance, singles out unoriginality as the guiding principle of academic speeches like inaugural orations 26 : […] questi testi obbediscono ad una topica estremamente rigida che li vincola ai binari di un percorso sempre uguale a se stesso, dall'inziale excusatio alla conseguente captatio benevolentiae, algi elogi delle autorità, dei professori, del principe e della città sede dello Studio, alla lode delle discipline insegnate nello Studio stesso, per concludersi con l'esortazione rivolta ai professori e, sopratutto, ai giovani a dedicarsi con alacrità rispettiamente all'insegnamento e all'apprendimento delle bonae artes.
These texts adhere to an extremely rigid content that binds them to the tracks of a path that is always the same, from the initial excusatio to the subsequent captatio benevolentiae, to the eulogy of the authorities, the professors, the prince and the city seat of the university, to the praise of the disciplines taught at the university itself, only to conclude with the exhortation addressed to the professors and, above all, to the young people to devote themselves eagerly to teaching and learning the bonae artes, respectively.orations are, for example, available with Willi Vomstein (ed.), Trudpert Neugart und die Einführung der biblischen Sprachen in das Theologiestudium an der Universität Freiburg i.Br.(Freiburg i.Br.: Goldschagg, 1958); Wilhelm Ebel (ed.), Jacob Grimm, De desiderio patriae: Antrittsrede an der Göttinger Universität, gehalten am 13.November 1830 (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1967 While it might not be completely unreasonable to conjecture that epideictic speeches follow a similar pattern with only little variation, there are numerous outstanding examples of supposedly 'epideictic orations' from the early modern context that prove otherwise (e.g., most speeches by the Dutch humanist Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa of Nettesheim27 ).This misunderstanding might have obscured the fact that inaugural orations feature special characteristics which developed in interplay with their ceremonial anchoring, complementing the ritualized practice of inception.
As far as can be deduced from the above-mentioned examination of material, the genre displays a rich diversity of topics, structural alignment and stylistic expressiveness in typological terms. 28Campanelli's assumption that the inaugural oration as a representative of occasional speech constantly reproduces the same patterns could, therefore, not be further from the truth.This holds true for the rhetorical orientation, too: generically, the inaugural oration cannot simply be classified as epideictic oratory, defined by the aim of creating mere rhetorical effect.In its entirety, it does not only not match the genus demonstrativum, that is, the Latin term for epideictic speech; it also does not match either of the other two classical genera causarum transmitted from and reused since Antiquity (the genus iudicale, applied for prosecution and defence in court, and the genus deliberativum, applied when recommending or warning against matters of personal or private interest). 29Rather, I argue, it combines all three of these forms to a new and original whole, constituting a form of speech sui generis: from the genus demonstrativum it takes the teaching in thought-provoking manner; from the genus iudicale it takes the indicative and/or apologetic stance; from the genus deliberativum it takes the incitement to action.
All these elements from the three genera causarum can be traced in amalgamated form in Melanchthon's DCAS.Melanchthon uses his oration as a platform to make his audience, particularly the students in the auditorium, knowledgeable about the studia humanitatis (e.g., when outlining the history of the arts and scholasticism from late ancient times to the recent past as in a demonstrative speech; DCAS, 31-5).At the same time, he takes the role of an advocate for the studia humanitatis, putting scholastic practices on trial (e.g., by employing courtroom-language throughout the entire oration as in orations given, among others, at the early modern Dutch university in Oratio historica -Reden über Geschichte: Untersuchungen zur praktischen Rhetorik während des spanisch-niederländischen Konfliktes im 16. und 17.Jahrhundert  (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2012).
28 This is elaborated in greater detail in my comprehensive study that is currently being written (cf.note 6 and 21 above). 29For an overview of the most common terms of rhetoric and speech, see Heinrich Lausberg, Handbuch der literarischen Rhetorik, 2 vols.(Munich: Hueber, 1960).
a judicial speech30 ), and urges his listeners (and readers) to recognize the value of humanism themselves and join his pro-humanist side (e.g., when prompting the students to abandon the scholastic method in favour of a humanist ideal as in a deliberative speech; DCAS, 31 and 42).By thus fully exploiting the possibilities of rhetoric, Melanchthon takes the opportunity to present his own learned position, map out his intentions and ambitions and represent himself as an authority to be reckoned with from now on in Wittenberg and -via word of mouth from the people present and via the printed version -in the academic world.In other words, he follows the inductive purpose of an inaugural oration and utilizes the oration as a tool to create his professorial persona, present himself and his core values and build his local and international reputation as an academic.
Against this typological and generic background, it is somewhat peculiar to see Melanchthon's inaugural oration everywhere declared a declamation without the slightest hesitation.This designation appears even more improbable once the early modern development of the declamation itself is considered.DCAS has been classed as a declamation since Karl Gottlieb Bretschneider's (1776-1848) inclusion of the speech among the declamations in the Corpus Reformatorum. 31However, from the point of view of modern research, this classification must be discarded as anachronistic.In 1518, the declamation was not yet properly known, let alone used, as an oratorical form at the German university, or indeed, any European university.Outside the university context, examples like Beroaldo's Declamatio altera philosophi, medici et oratoris de excellentia disceptantium (written in 1497 and printed in 1518) or Erasmus' Declamatio de morte (1518) were also as yet rare. 32The German humanist Beatus Rhenanus (1485-1547), for instance, accordingly complains in a contemporary letter about the upheld practice of the 'quarrelsome disputation' ('rixosae disputationes'), which he wishes to see replaced soon by the 'art of declamation' ('declamare'). 33He decries the fact that the declamation has not yet been established as a form of oratorical practice in education.As far as we know, the humanists only reached a clear generic idea of the declamation towards the end of the sixteenth century, after it had widely caught on as a rhetorical exercise at Protestant institutions of learning in the 1540s.This is manifest from Pierre Pithou's Praefatio in Quintiliani declamationes (1580) and Andrew Schott's De declamandi ratione (1603). 34ven if we grant Melanchthon the honor of having introduced the declamation into the training courses of Wittenberg University, whence it spread among the Protestant educational world and, ultimately, the Jesuit Ratio studiorum, his inaugural oration had nothing to do with these efforts.It is only in 1519, in the preface of De rhetorica libri tres, that Melanchthon mentions the declamation for the first time as a useful rhetorical exercise when praising ancient rhetorical education 35 : 'Exercebatur iuventus pulcherrima ratione, cum propositis thematis declamaret; qui labor et animum et vires augebat'.-'Young men were trained according to a highly effective method, namely by declaiming topics suggested.This method both expanded their minds and increased their knowledge'.He does not allude to DCAS in this context, however, which he might as well have done, had he considered it an early example of the exercise suggested.It was not before 1523, when Melanchthon served his first term as rector of Wittenberg University, that he proposed the implementation of the declamation as part of his curriculum revision at the Philosophical Faculty; a year later, in 1524, he himself gave the first declamation at Wittenberg University to initiate this practice, 36 but the official prescription of the declamatory practice in Wittenberg had to await enforcement until 1536.
From then on, there would be two declamations each month in Wittenberg, held on Saturdays and alternating with the performance of disputations.All declamations were given by students as an exercise in Latin eloquence and recital.Each professor would mount the rostrum to give a declamation just once a year. 37The reason for this rare professorial delivery was that the primary goal of the declamations was to train the students to become better speakers, capable of a clear pronunciation as well as a coherent argument.Melanchthon had initiated the introduction of the declamation because he had recognized the students' deficiencies in oral delivery, which he saw as one of the legacies of scholastic education. 38His understanding of the declamation was that it formed a central instrument of student exercises rather than being an aspect of professorial competence.This was consistent with what was known, at the time, about the declamation as a genre of ancient eloquence: in both the anonymous Rhetorica ad Herennium (3.11 and 3.12.20)and Quintilian's Institutio oratoria (2.10.1-15 and 10.5.14-8), the declamation is described, in primis, as a tool to be applied by students.39This is also why Melanchthon writes 'exercebatur iuventus' in the above-cited passage from De rhetorica libri tres, even allocating the phrase the front position in the sentence.
Why DCAS is still anachronistically called a declamation or -even if it is designated an 'inaugural address' or 'inaugural oration' -conceptualized as and compared to a declamation in publications on Melanchthon, as if the two terms were synonyms, 40 ignoring the Renaissance emergence of the declamation as well as the typological development of the inaugural oration, remains a mystery.For even if DCAS was integrated many times in declamation collections, such as Liber selectarum declamationum Philippi Melanthonis (printed in Strasbourg in 1541), the inclusion of DCAS was mainly an editor's choice without any involvement on Melanchthon's part. 41A similar case exists with Lorenzo Valla's proof of the forgery that is the donation of Constantine (De falso credita et ementita donatione Constantini, written in 1440).It was advertised as a declamation for the first time in Ulrich von Hutten's edition of 1518 (which, coincidentally, came out the same year as Melanchthon's DCAS).So far, scholarship has expressed slight doubts concerning this attribution, but nobody has yet clarified the matter. 42Perhaps today's confusion surrounding the question of what can be classified a declamation and what cannot has to do with the imprecise definitions provided.These definitions usually circle around topoi of rhetorical perfectionism or denominate a range of different speeches in both the non-academic and the academic context. 43At the same time, disagreement prevails regarding the declamation's relation to the three genera causarum. 44n either case, the essential feature making a declamatio a declamatio since ancient times is passed over: its pedagogic character.The term declamatio does not simply function as an umbrella term for any sort of polished oratory.Rather, it is a piece of training in Latin eloquence, comparable to today's seminar presentation. 45As such, declamations bore no link to academic graduation or inception ceremonies, where only 'accomplished speech' was allowed or expected.An oration held on the occasion of professorial investiture, like DCAS, could therefore technically never be a declamation.Rather, an inaugural oration marks the result of many years of rhetorical training; it is an act of professional performance achieved through previous exercise.
Other vague aspects often cited to classify declamations equally lose their weight in the context of defining DCAS as an inaugural oration.The claim, for instance, that the declamation shows strong moralistic tendencies 46 does not imply, by reverse of argument, that Melanchthon's DCAS -as much as it was full of ethical thoughts on what is 'good' education -was indeed a declamation.After all, the accordance of orator and vir bonus underpins any type of early modern oration, no matter its specific genre or form.The equation derives from Cato's theory of the orator as a morally sound man, which famously resounded in humanist circles through Cicero's and Quintilian's writings. 47Another claim makes a similarly weak argument to label DCAS as a declamation, namely that declamations display 'a strong desire for communication with intellectual equals, and a keen grasp of appropriate ways in which to bring about a fruitful exchange of thought'. 48his specification indeed matches an oration like DCAS, but it really matches any type of early modern oration, especially inaugural orations, and even rather standardized ones, such as funerary or congratulatory orations, which often comprise a wealth of generalizations and intertextual play only loosely tied to the occasion.
Finally, the way arguments are produced in declamations does not align with the one-sided and almost opinionated debating inherent in inaugural orations, in general, and in DCAS, in particular.While it is in the nature of the declamatory exercise to discuss a topic or thesis from more than one point of view (the famous arguing in utrumque partes) without passing a definitive judgement, 49 the inaugural oration works differently.It is about a professor giving his learned opinion about a current topic of interest, leaving no room for ambiguity or interpretation.Melanchthon presents his idea of education in DCAS in exactly this way: He does not take into consideration any views other than his own.He insists that scholasticism is responsible for the demise of education and that a renaissance of the trivium will remedy this demise.In his evaluation of scholasticism, Melanchthon even judges harshly when discarding scholastic scholars as 'Cadmean brood' ('Cadmea sobole'; DCAS, 32), 'inflated teachers' ('bullatos magistros'; DCAS, 34) or 'ignorant teachers' ('inscitiae magistri'; DCAS, 35), as well as rejecting their teaching as 'the origins of bad education' ('non bona doceri coepta'; DCAS, 32) and 'the deeds of buffoons' ('nugari'; DCAS, 39).His judgement is definite and assertive.
To close the case against the attribution of DCAS to the humanist declamation, three final declamatory aspects should be highlighted that Melanchthon's speech lacks.First, there is the missing indication of the oration's generic affiliation in the title.As Marc van der Poel points out, the most relevant sign of a declamation being a declamation is its according designation (which even appears in the first examples of the gerne, such as Filippo Beroaldo's Declamatio altera philosphi, medici et oratoris de excellentia disceptantium, Erasmus' Declamatio de laude matrimonii and Johannes Reusch's Declamatio de vero philosopho, et philosophiae origine ac partitione [all published in 1518, i.e., in the same year as DCAS]). 50Melanchthon simply titles his oration a sermo (sermon, speech), which is not uncommon for fifteenthand sixteenth-century inaugural orations, even if it is not standard either. 51econd, printed declamations by humanists like those mentioned typically were not delivered orally but meant for print only.Anita Traninger, therefore, calls this kind of declamations orationes non dictae. 52Since Melanchthon verifiably held DCAS as part of his inception ceremony -even if he may have made some changes for the print -surely one cannot speak of his oration as an oratio non dicta.Third, declamations tend to be framed by introduced personae, mediating between the author and the audience or, rather, speaking the author's mind instead of having the author himself directly address an issue. 53An exemplary case constitute Juan Luis Vives' five Declamationes Syllanae (1520), which feature various real and fictional personae giving a speech on the abdication of the dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla.In DCAS, however, Melanchthon unhesitatingly and confidently approaches the audience without any pretension.In fact, his oration decidedly starts with the personal pronoun 'I' ('ego'; DCAS, 30): 'I do not want to give the impression […]' ('Ne ego plane videar […]').Melanchthon as 50 Van der Poel, 'The Latin Declamatio', 472. 51Traninger,Disputation,Deklamation,Dialog,[199][200][201][202][203] the speaker and new professor is the sole centre of attention.Given that the main aim of an inaugural oration was for the new professor to present himself to the corporation and the public, the distancing force of a mediating persona would have impeded the earnest goal of self-fashioning that Melanchthon pursued and, in fact, achieved so well. COCLUSION Melanchthon's DCAS, a speech given on the occasion of being appointed professor of Greek at the University of Wittenberg in 1518, has long been acknowledged as a central piece of Neo-Latin humanist literature.Its impact on the promotion of the studia humanitatis at the early modern German university -both Protestant and Catholic -cannot be estimated highly enough.While scholarship has had a lot to say about this impact in the past, the attribution to the declamatory genre, resulting from inconsistent historical usage of oratorical labels, has never been questioned.
This article has challenged the seemingly anachronistic labelling of DCAS as a declamation and clarified its generic form.To this end, the revival of the humanist Latin declamation was first revisited to show that this was a revival that only happened years after the delivery of DCAS.Second, another genre of academic oratory was introduced into the discourse, namely the inaugural oration.Since the inaugural oration has not sparked much interest in contrast to other genres of academic oratory (like the disputation or the prolusio), DCAS has never been considered from the perspective of inauguration rhetoric.The argument demonstrated, however, that DCAS fits the framework of academic instatement in many instances, while it does not conform to crucial elements of the declamation as a form of rhetorical speech (e.g., regarding the aspect of exercise, the generic designation in the title, the argument in utrumque partes, the persona mediating between author and audience).The insights produced in this article will facilitate a better understanding of the rhetorical strategies employed by Melanchthon, as well as certain ideas voiced (or left unvoiced) in DCAS.Furthermore, the article puts the spotlight on a neglected genre of academic rhetoric, providing a useful starting point for further research.

University of Innsbruck
MELANCHTHON'S FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE IN WITTENBERG Although the University of Wittenberg was founded in 1502 by Frederick III, Elector of Saxony (1463-1525), as a 'home' for an education less 5 Representative studies from the most recent past are Anita Traninger, Disputation, Deklamation, Dialog: Medien und Gattungen europäischer Wissensverhandlungen zwischen Scholastik und Humanismus (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2012); Olga Weijers, In Search of the Truth: A History of Disputation Techniques from Antiquity to Early Modern Times (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013); Annamaria Lesigang-Bruckmüller, 'Prolusio academica und Programma: Zwei akademische Textsorten im Vergleich', in Astrid Steiner-Weber and Karl Enenkel (eds.),Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Monasteriensis: Proceedings of the Fifteenth International Congress of Neo-Latin Studies (Münster 2012) (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 359-70; Clémence Revest (ed.), Discours Académiques: L'Eloquence Solennelle à l'Université entre Scolastique et Humanisme (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2020); Kevin Chang, 'For the Love of the Truth: The Dissertation as a Genre of Scholarly Publication in Early Modern Europe', KNOW.A Journal on the Formation of For an example of a recent case study relating to the inaugural oration as a distinct genre of academic oratory, see Isabella Walser-Bürgler, of the scholastic studium generale, 7 the call for proper reform grew louder after the first decade.Especially theologians, including Martin Luther (1483-1546), Nikolaus von Amsdorf (1483-1565) and Andreas Bodenstein von Karlstadt (1486-1541), increasingly questioned existing doctrines and sought new methods to approach the original Bible text.Soon they realized that the development of new doctrines and methods required a better knowledge of not only Latin but also the biblical languages, Hebrew and Greek.In 1516, therefore, they drafted a catalogue of measures addressed to Frederick III, in which all their criticisms of the curriculum were listed, alongside concrete ideas for reform.8Most of the changes pertained to the deepened study of languages at the Philosophical Faculty or Faculty of Arts, through which every student had to pass.Frederick accepted the proposal in 1518 and, subsequently, established seven new chairs: one for Greek, one for Hebrew, two for elementary courses in Greek, Hebrew and Latin grammar at the Pädagogium of Wittenberg University, and three for Aristotelian philosophy (logic, physics, zoology). 9 'Jacob Grimm als Cicero wider Willen?Die Propagierung der deutschen Kulturnation in Grimms Antrittsrede De desiderio patriae (1830)', in Valerio Sanzotta (ed.), Una lingua morta per letterature vive: Il dibattito sul latino come lingua letteraria in età moderna e contemporanea (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2020), 221-55.reminiscent 13 Information on Melanchthon's appearance is scattered in Kuropka,Melanchthon, 19; Heinz Scheible,   'Der Bildungsreformer Melanchthon', in Asche et al. (eds.),Die Leucorea, 93-115 (at 96, referring to Melanchthon's own statements in this regard); Christine Mundhenk, 'Leben', in Günter Frank (ed.), Philipp Melanchthon: Der Reformator zwischen Glauben und Wissen (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2017), 25-42 (at 27).reading of Latin, Greek and Hebrew sources.Only the unadulterated text, he says, fosters moral insights because first, one reads it with the awareness of reaching truth; second, it enlightens the 'real' past for the benefit of the present and the future; third, to learn any of the three old languages is truly to educate the mind and to teach it to think clearly and communicate in a coherent, logical manner.Melanchthon's high esteem of language studies, in this respect, is also pointedly expressed in the original print's dedicatory letter to the theologian Otto Beckmann (1476-1540) 18 : 'Nihil efficacius est ad mutanda ingenia moresque hominum litteris'.-'Nothing is more effective in changing men's minds and characters than the study of literature'.This is where both Melanchthon's pedagogical guiding principle of eloquentia and the Reformation ideal of eloquens et sapientia enters the discourse.
20A detailed overview of the printing history of DCAS is offered in de Boer, Die Gelehrtenwelt ordnen, 328-9.17Cf.Marc van der Poel, 'Oratory andDeclamation', in Victoria Moul (ed.),AGuide to Neo-Latin Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 272-88 (at 277): 'Within the genre of epideictic speeches written to be delivered in public, the speeches delivered in an academic […] setting probably constitute the largest corpus'.original19INAUGURAL ORN INSTEAD OF DECLAMATIONThe inaugural oration was one of the many genres cultivated at the early modern university.Embedded in the rich context of academic festivities,20inaugural orations were held on the occasion of the assumption of an academic office, typically by professors and university rectors, but, depending on a university's tradition, sometimes also by librarians and superintendents of scientific facilities like observatories, botanical gardens or anatomical cabinets.Based on a first assessment of extant prints in major European libraries and on online platforms like Bibliography of Books Printed in the German Speaking Countries of the Sixteenth/Seventeenth/Eighteenth Century (VD16, VD17, VD18), the International Bibliography of Humanism and the Renaissance (1500-1700), Iter.Gateway to the Middle Ages & Renaissance or the Analytic Bibliography of On-Line Neo-Latin texts, the inaugural oration seems to have flourished especially in the German Empire, Northern Italy and the Netherlands from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries.