Il nobile incanto del discorso epidittico. Valori e limiti dell’epitafio nel Menesseno di Platone

This paper examines Plato’s Menexenus, demonstrating how the dialogue offers a critical yet constructive rethinking of certain aspects of the Athenian epideictic eloquence. Through a complex interplay of irony and seriousness, Plato engages with the epitaph, highlighting its strengths and weaknesses. The analysis reveals that the sarcasm is directed solely at the Athenian rhetoricians who wrote superficial speeches that amounted to mere flattery. By contrast, the epitaph attributed to Aspasia and delivered by Socrates, though written by Plato, is an exemplary encomium. Using the limited potential of this democratic propaganda tool in a philosophical way, it produces a noble rhetorical enchantment: its refined style is balanced by a careful content construction, capable of valuable psychagogic and paideutic functions.