Apollonius Molon

Apollonius Molon or Molo of Rhodes (or simply Molon; Ancient Greek: Ἀπολλώνιος ὁ Μόλων), Greek rhetorician who flourished about 70 BC.

He was a native of Alabanda, a pupil of Menecles, and settled at Rhodes. He twice visited Rome as an ambassador from Rhodes, and Marcus Tullius Cicero (who visited him during his trip to Greece in 79-77BC) and Gaius Julius Caesar both took lessons from him. Perhaps it is credit of Apollonius Molon's work that Cicero and Caesar, Cicero especially, became revered orators in the Roman Republic.^{[citation needed]} He is reputed to have quoted Demosthenes in telling his pupils that the first three elements in rhetoric were "Delivery, Delivery and Delivery." He had a stellar reputation in Roman Law courts, and was even invited to address the Roman Senate in Greek - an honor not usually bestowed upon foreign ambassadors. He endeavored to moderate the florid Asiatic style and cultivated an "Atticizing" tendency. He wrote on Homer, and, according to Josephus, violently attacked the Jews.

References

• C. Müller, Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, iii.
• Emil Schürer, Story of the Jewish People, iii. (Eng. tr. 1886).
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.