Pronunciation: dis-tri-bu'-ti-o
Alternate Spelling: L. “apportionment, division”
Assigning roles among or specifying the duties of a list of people, sometimes accompanied by a conclusion. Sometimes this term is simply a synonym for diaeresis or merismus, which are more general figures involving division.
The prosecutor's job is to bring charges; the defence lawyer's, to answer and downplay these; the witness, to state truthfully what has been seen or heard, the judge, to keep all these three doing what they ought. To allow a witness to make accusations only confuses the role of a prosecutor with those of a witness...