This paper investigates the reuse of terminology and metaphorical expressions, characteristic of Callimachus’ poetics, by Atticists in their polemic against Asianists. This very analysis shows how expressions, already used in rhetorical treatises concerning the two genera dicendi, subtile and grave, have been re-semanticized by the Atticists in a Callimachean manner. The aims and implications of this re-sematization will be examined.