Anonymous

The art of letter writing is explored in this piece by Anonymous. Ars dictaminis started out as any written text, but was later reduced to just letter writing. At first, letters were not taken so lightly as they are today since not everybody could read and write, and attaining literacy was expensive.  Cicero had listed six parts of speech that were later conformed to a model for writing letters. These six parts of speech consist of the exordium (introduction), narratio (background information), divisio (outline of the upcoming argument), confirmatio (argument or proof), refutatio (rebuttle), and peroratio (conclusion). After applying these six elements of speech to written text, specifically letters, the formula had to change because written text is entirely different than oration. For example, when applying these aspects of speech to letter writing, Alberic had to remove the one that focuses on argument because not all letters have an argument as much as they just relay facts or news from one person to the next. I  think that the formula for speech changed when it was applied to written letters because letters fulfill a different purpose than speech does.