Ars grammatica
generic title for surveys of Latin grammar
An ars grammatica (English: art of grammar) is a generic or proper title for surveys of Latin grammar. The first ars grammatica seems to have been composed by Remmius Palaemon (first century AD), but is now lost. The most famous ars grammatica since late antiquity has been that composed by Donatus and was one of the first experimental texts printed by Gutenberg.
Donatus' Ars Grammatica
Two artes grammaticae circulate under the name Donatus. The first, the Ars Minor, is a brief overview of the eight parts of speech: noun, pronoun, verb, adverb, participle, conjunction, preposition, and interjection (nomen, pronomen, verbum, adverbium, participium, conjunctio, praepositio, interjectio). The text is presented entirely in a question-and-answer format (e.g. "How many numbers does a noun have?" "Two: singular and plural.").
Donatus' Ars Major is only a little longer, but on a much more elevated plane. It consists of a list of stylistic faults and graces, including tropes such as metaphor, synecdoche, allegory, and sarcasm. Donatus also includes schemes such as zeugma and anaphora.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ars grammatica” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.