Rhetoric and Scientia Civilis at the Royal Academy of Turku, 1777–1804
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 19218249 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jaska Kainulainen (0000-0002-6771-5006, University of Helsinki, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Pages | 1-18 |
| Publication date | 2026-06-15 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | History of European Ideas (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0191-6599 • E-ISSN: 1873-541X |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/01916599.2026.2683824 |
| OpenAlex | W7164804478 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 10 |
Henrik Gabriel Porthan was the professor of eloquence at the Royal Academy of Turku from 1777 until his death in 1804. During that period, he supervised 221 dissertations, approximately half of which he authored by himself. This article argues that Porthan and his students identified rhetoric as a part of political science and—focusing on notions such as civic duty, citizenship and patria—embraced Ciceronian rhetoric and civic philosophy typical of Renaissance humanists. The article analyses a selection of dissertations supervised by Porthan and suggests that, while loyal and patriotic citizens of Sweden, the endorsement of Ciceronian rhetoric and scientia civilis by Porthan and his students paved the way for nineteenth-century expressions of Finnish nationhood
Citizenship · Political philosophy · Political rhetoric · Politics · Rhetoric · The Renaissance · Central European national history · Historical Legal Studies and Society · Philosophy, History, and Historiography
| Highly cited | No |
|---|