128 RHETORICA not place Isocrates neatly in his category of epideictic. Again, Walker's sub­ tle argument that the Ciceronian ideal eloquence draws on the "epideictic registers" (p. 83) ignores many of Cicero's own quite dismissive remarks concerning epideictic or demonstrative oratory Others may have reservations similar to these concerning Walker's reconstruction of the enthymeme, but will find it difficult not to admire his patience in testing the concept in his readings of the archaic poets. And these observations do not diminish the value of this very ambitious and challenging book. Walker's revitalization of "epideictic" should provoke greater scrutiny of the ancient understandings of that category. His blurring the traditional boundaries separating rhetoric from poetics is both innovative and cogent. The "rhetorical poetics" he proposes will no doubt be profitably applied in the study of lyric forms from many cultures subsequent to that of archaic Greece. Richard Graff University ofMinnesota Martin Camargo ed., Medieval Rhetorics of Prose Composition: Five English "Artes Dictandi" and their Tradition, Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies 115, (Binghamton, NY: Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies, 1995), xiv + 257 pp. In studying the history of letter-writing in the medieval culture of Eng­ land, Martin Camargo has made a pioneering achievement, the first critical editions of five treatises on epistolary composition by writers in England. Al­ though four of these works can be identified as belonging to the Late Middle Ages, they nevertheless represent a significant part of England's contribution to epistolography. Camargo's introduction, a meticulously written summary of the history of letter-writing in England from the late twelfth century to the mid-fifteenth, is a model of craftsmanship and painstaking research. Descriptions of the manuscript copies, the text, the author, and the struc­ ture and contents of the work in outline form, where appropriate, precede each text. Massive compilations of variant readings comprising the apparatus criticus and large collections of references to sources and analogues along with comments related to meaning, syntax, and vocabulary follow each text. Rearranged as footnotes throughout each edited text, the variant readings and notes would have precluded an arduous task for the reader who must constantly be turning pages. The carefully edited texts presented in chronological sequence begin with Libellus de arte dictandi rhetorice by Peter of Blois, the earliest treatise on letter-writing produced in England and found only in Cambridge University Library MS. Dd 9 38. This study should contain the last reference to the Reviews 129 uncertainty of Peter's authorship, as it has recently been shown that Peter of Blois was the author of this work. An edition of the prologue in Migne, PL. 207, cols. 1127-1128 is not mentioned. The second text is Compilacio de arte dictandi by John of Briggis, probably written in the late fourteenth century at Oxford, which survives in one copy in Bodleian Library MS. Douce 52. The next text is Formula moderni et usitati dictaminis, written c. 1390 by Thomas Marke, of which the most preferred copy is in Lincoln Cathedral Library MS. 237. Although a copy found in Newberry Library MS. 55 is described, Paul Saenger's A Catalogue of the Pre-1500 Western Manuscript Books ...(Chicago and London, 1989) pp. 96-97 is not cited. The fourth text is Modus dictandiby Thomas Sampson, who taught at Oxford in the second half of the fourteenth century. One complete copy is found in British Library MS. Royal 17 B XLVII. An omitted study is J. I. Catto and T. A. R. Evans, The History ofthe University of Oxford, II, pp. 524-526. The final text is the anonymous Regina sedens Rhetorica, found in three manuscripts, the fullest text of which is in British Library MS. Royal 10 B IX. By way of suggestion and not criticism, a more complete survey of the history of letter-writing in England should include Gervase, Abbot of Premontre, Robert Elenryson, Thomas Hoccleve, Richard Emsay, Ralph of Fresburn, John Wethamstede, John of Latro, Richard Kendale, Joseph Meddus, John Mason, and references to anonymous treatises as found, for example, in Manchester, Chetham's Library MS. Mun. A 3 130 and Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. lat. misc. f 49. This study...