Didactics: from classical rhetoric to kitchen-latin

The article discusses the relationship between the ancient traditions of dialectics and rhetoric and the transformations they underwent through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, particularly because of the emergence of Humanism. The French philosopher Pierre de la Ramée (1515–1572) played an essential role in this transformation. The logic inherent in rhetoric was simply transferred to a new interpretation of the essence of dialectics: how to know about a subject and how to teach it. The changes in society demanded a new and rational system of schooling, and the drive in economic, religious, cultural and academic life towards more systematical and methodical thinking ripened the context for the birth of a new concept: didactics, which Ratke and Comenius developed in the early modern period of European history.