Trivium
The trivium is the lower division of the
The trivium is implicit in De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii ("On the Marriage of Philology and Mercury") by Martianus Capella, but the term was not used until the Carolingian Renaissance, when it was coined in imitation of the earlier quadrivium.[2] Grammar, logic, and rhetoric were essential to a classical education, as explained in Plato's dialogues. The three subjects together were denoted by the word trivium during the Middle Ages, but the tradition of first learning those three subjects was established in ancient Greece, by rhetoricians such as Isocrates.[3]: 12–23 Contemporary iterations have taken various forms, including those found in certain British and American universities (some being part of the Classical education movement) and at the independent Oundle School in the United Kingdom.[4]
Etymology
Etymologically, the Latin word trivium means "the place where three roads meet" (tri + via); hence, the subjects of the trivium are the foundation for the
Description
Logic (also dialectic) is the "mechanics" of thought and of analysis, the process of composing sound arguments and identifying fallacious arguments and statements and so systematically removing contradictions, thereby producing factual knowledge that can be trusted.
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Rhetoric |
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Rhetoric is the application of language in order to instruct and to persuade the listener and the reader. It is the knowledge (grammar) now understood (logic) and being transmitted outwards as wisdom (rhetoric).
Aristotle defined rhetoric as, "the power of perceiving in every thing that which is capable of producing persuasion."[5]
Sister Miriam Joseph, in The Trivium: The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric (2002), described the trivium as follows:
Grammar is the art of inventing symbols and combining them to express thought; logic is the art of thinking; and rhetoric is the art of communicating thought from one mind to another, the adaptation of language to circumstance.
. . .
Grammar is concerned with the thing as-it-is-symbolized. Logic is concerned with the thing as-it-is-known. Rhetoric is concerned with the thing as-it-is-communicated.[6]
John Ayto wrote in the Dictionary of Word Origins (1990) that study of the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) was requisite preparation for study of the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy). For the medieval student, the trivium was the curricular beginning of the acquisition of the seven
See also
References
- ^ a b Onions, C.T., ed. (1991). The Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. p. 944.
- ^ Marrou, Henri-Irénée (1969). "Les arts libéraux dans l'Antiquité classique". pp. 6–27 in Arts libéraux et philosophie au Moyen Âge. Paris: Vrin; Montréal: Institut d'études médiévales). pp. 18–19.
- ISBN 978-0-313-20473-9.
- ^ See Martin Robinson, Trivium 21st century. Each of these iterations was discussed in a conference at King's College London on the future of the liberal arts at schools and universities; see [1] Archived 2016-05-25 at the Wayback Machine and Boarding Schools Association,Oundle School - improving intellectual challenge Archived 2020-08-15 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ Taylor, Thomas (1811). The Rhetoric, Poetic and Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle. London: Robert Wilks. p. 6.
- ISBN 9781589882737.
- ISBN 1-55970-214-1.
Further reading
- ISBN 1-58423-067-3.
- Michell, John, Rachel Holley, Earl Fontainelle, Adina Arvatu, Andrew Aberdein, Octavia Wynne, and Gregory Beabout. "Trivium: The Classical Liberal Arts of Grammar, Logic, & Rhetoric. New York: Bloomsbury, 2016. Print. Wooden Books".
- Robinson, Martin (2013). Trivium 21c: Preparing Young People for the Future with Lessons from the Past. London: Independent Thinking Press. ISBN 978-178135054-6.
- Sayers, Dorothy L. (1947). "The Lost Tools of Learning". Essay presented at Oxford University.
- Winterer, Caroline (2002). The Culture of Classicism: Ancient Greece and Rome in American Intellectual Life, 1780–1910. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.