Entitled: "Rhetoricae gratos sermoni astuta c籀lores quo dulcius fluat is ad aureis, adycit". Print created by Cornelis Cort, 1565, showing a woman wearing classical robes and holding a caduceus. She is seated on a throne-like chair, and beneath her is the label "Rhetorica." To her left is a man seated on the ground writing on a tablet. An old man with a long beard leans over his shoulder. At the woman's feet is a pile of books, each labeled with a name: Cicero, Hortensius, Aeschines, Isocrates, Demosthenes, Quintilianus. Two birds are perched on top of the pile. A courtyard is visible through an open window, where a platform has been set up against a building wall. A few figures are standing on the platform and a crowd of people is grouped below it. Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the capability of writers or speakers to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. From Ancient Greece to the late 19th century, it was a central part of Western education, filling the need to train public speakers and writers to move audiences to action with arguments.