Additional information
by L. Borgies (Author)
English summary: By blaming each other for obscure and degrading origins, cruelty, cowardice, oratorical and literary incompetence, debaucheries, luxury, drunkenness and other slanders, Octavian and Mark Antony, between 44-30 BC, endeavoured to destroy their respective political foe's reputation in the eyes of various publics. Unfortunately, until now, invectives have not yet benefitted from the academic attention they deserve, which is doubly regrettable as the rhetorical genre of uituperatio is a perfect illustration for the use of propaganda in Antiquity and helps to contest the traditional focus put on coinage and poetry. Through its tripartite structure, the present book offers, for the first time, an encompassing view of the uituperatio of this period, analysed in turn according to the rhetorical themes of the invectives, the public concerned, and the forms and supports by which it is conveyed. It demonstrates that, by its strenuous and fierce expression, the uituperatio not only became a tool of war, but also prefigured the ideological basis of the Augustan Principate. French description: En se criblant mutuellement d'origines obscures et degradantes, de cruaute, de lachete, d'incompetence oratoire et litteraire, de debauches, de luxure, d'ivrognerie et autres traits infamants, Octavien et Marc Antoine, entre 44 et 30 a. C. n., tenterent de demolir systematiquement l'image de leur adversaire politique respectif aupres de divers publics. Or, le role joue par ces invectives n'a pas encore suffisamment retenu l'attention de la recherche, ce qui est d'autant plus regrettable que le genre rhetorique de la uituperatiose prete a merveille a une utilisation critique du concept de propagande et remet en question la primaute generalement accordee aux emissions monetaires et a la poesie. Par sa structure tripartite, ce livre offre, pour la premiere fois, une vue globale de lauituperatio de cette periode, analysee tour a tour selon les themes rhetoriques des invectives, les publics auxquels elle s'adresse, et les formes et les supports par lesquels elle est vehiculee. Il demontre que, par sa virulence et la vigueur de son expression, la uituperatione devient pas seulement une arme de guerre, mais prefigure aussi les fondements ideologiques du Principat augusteen.
