JJP Supplement 17 (2012) Journal of Juristic Papyrology (Hardback)

Cicero's Topica is a kind of compendium of arguments that functioned in ancient philosophy and rhetoric and were destined for jurists. The present book analyzes one of the patterns of argumentation described by Cicero, an argument drawn from the similarity of cases (argumentum a simili). Although this pattern was so important for the Roman legal discourse, it has hardly been discussed in modern scholarly literature so far, as it extends beyond formal logic. The study by Agnieszka Kacprzak is clearly interdisciplinary, drawing from the Roman law, theory of rethoric, philosophy, and history of logic. Therefore, its should be of interest not only for specialists in the Roman law but also for those who study antiquity in its various aspects.