this morning i was exploring the word 'apocryphal', and i stumbled across an interesting rhetorical term: apocrisis

my source described it merely as "replying to one's own arguments". can anyone elucidate further? the Greek word "apokrisis" merely means "an answer", so how did apocrisis come to encompass also the aspect of self-argument?

it would seem the ultimate case of diversivolence, when one starts arguing with oneself ~ what a fun word for the philopolemics among us!

As usual, you're way ahead of me, goddess dear, but it will be fun trying to catch up with you a bit.
"apocrisis" reminds me of the man who talked to himself because he liked an intelligent audience.

cadit quaestio: The question falls; there is no discussion.

P.S. I found a bunch of sites about "apokrisis" meaning answer. But nothing about answering own arguments.

caradea,

although OED doesn't deign to define the word, it can be found therein in the following citation:
A Giltynge, apocrisis, deauracio., which to me suggests that answering your own question is akin to gilding the lily.

also, an apocrisiary is a person appointed to give and receive answers; spec. a papal nuncio.

-joe (on a thursday) friday

p.s. - I can't remember if this has come up before, but Shakespeare didn't coin the phrase "gild(ing) the lily"

To gilde refined Gold, to paint the Lilly; To throw a perfume on the Violet,..Is wastefull, and ridiculous excesse. - John IV; the transposition is fairly modern.

OED doesn't deign to define the word

It's not a Flower in the Forest of Rhetoric, either.

http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/silva.htm

Maybe it's a legal term?

Maybe it's a legal term?
I'll check.
Edit: Black's Law Dictionary lists it as one of a number of phrases under "cadere: Lat. To end; cease; fail; as in phrases such as ..." The is no indication whether the legal usage was the origin of the phrase.

apocrisis

Ah, gorillas under stress?

There is a word site that has many rhetoric words with definition that someone else gave URL to recently:

http://rinkworks.com/words/linguistics.shtml

I know this is seriously off on a tangent but I had to say it. I already posted in Your Best Experience so I don't want to take any more space there but I want to tell you how special I think this place is because somebody can start a sentence with :

this morning i was exploring the word 'apocryphal'

and nobody thinks it is weird and people are interested and participate in the conversation and it is fun.

bel--I love you!

how special I think this place is because somebody can ... and nobody thinks it is weird

Amen to that, bel. How cozy to be with those with you have in common an uncommon madness for words.

`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'