Abstract EN:

This thesis first aims at filling 2 gaps : the latest critical studies goes back to the beginning of the century (raderlacher, 1901; rhys roberts, 1902), and the latest french translations go to back further (durassier, guillemot, 1875); the greek text certainly needed updating, by taking into account the increasing number of manuscript data. The previous editors knew of some 15 manuscripts. We have been able to catalogue 45 copies, either complete or incomplete. The analysis of the new data sheds no new light on the question but enables us to complete the information found inthe par. Gr. 1741 by that of the marc. Gr. 508 -the latter dating back, according to us, not to the former but to a common source. 2ly, the study attemps to clarify the problem of the dating of the work. We think that it should be located (though not so early as grube thought (c. 270 bc), before the great rhetorical works of the lst bc. Lastly we endeavour to highlight the importance of this ionteresting and valuable little document. Based on a penetrating critical and often innovative interpretation of aristotle's texts devoted to style and ethics, on the exploiting of mainly peripatetic-inspired sources (but where stoic influences are traceable -notably mid-stoicism-), the treatise on style provides an original theory of expression, in direct opposition to the aristotelian philosophical model, half way between technical rhetoric and more purely literary conceptions.