Accumulatio

Accumulatio is a figure of speech, part of the more general group of enumeratio, in which the statements made previously are presented again in a compact, forceful manner. It often uses a climax for the summation of a speech.

The word is Latin, from a verb meaning "to amass".

Examples

• "Your organization, your vigilance, your devotion to duty, your zeal for the cause must be raised to the highest intensity." Winston Churchill, Speech, 14 July 1941. (This sentence comes after a lengthy passage in which Churchill warns the public that their courage and effort are still needed to defeat the enemy).
• "He is the betrayer of his own self-respect, and the waylayer of the self-respect of others; covetous, intemperate, irascible, arrogant; disloyal to his parents, ungrateful to his friends, troublesome to his kin; insulting to his betters, disdainful of his equals and mates, cruel to his inferiors; in short, he is intolerable to everyone." (Suae pudicitiae proditor est, insidiator alienae; cupidus intemperans, petulans superbus; impius in parentes, ingratus in amicos, infestus cognatis; in superiores contumax, in aequos et pares fastidiosus, in inferiores crudelis; denique in omnes intolerabilis.) Attributed to Cicero, Rhetorica ad Herennium, IV.52

See also

• Climax
• Figure of speech