  Philodemus’ authority for many of his claims about the content and interpretation of Epicurean teaching is his own teacher, Zeno of Sidon. In Rhetoric II, for example, Philodemus defends Zeno’s view that the first Epicureans denied forensic and political rhetoric the status of ‘arts’ or ‘expertises’ (technai), while conceding it to ‘sophistic’ or panegyric rhetoric (cf. Blank 2001).  Elsewhere, Philodemus gives an extended defence of Zeno’s running of the school, his conception of the Epicurean wise man, his attitude toward and use of the founders’ texts, and his balanced understanding of Epicurus’ hostility toward the liberal arts, in opposition to some recent Epicureans, who are criticized for their ‘laziness regarding books’ and who, Zeno said, had only a superficial knowledge of the principal texts, based on epitomes. The title of the book (PHerc. 1005/862 and 1485) in which this argument is conducted, and which was apparently the first of a set, is only partially preserved, as Pros tous […], which, to compound the difficulty, could mean either that it is addressed ‘to’ certain persons whose identity is now lost, or that it is written ‘against’ them. It has been published under the titles Against the [sophists] and To the [companions in the school (hetairous)] (thus, ad contubernales in Latin, and is now read as, for instance, Against those [no good at knowing the books] (Puglia 2015) or Against those [who claim to know the books] (Del Mastro 2014).