'Rhetorical' is Greek for 'of public speaking' — from PIE *wer- (to speak). Kin to 'word' and 'verb.'
Relating to or concerned with the art of rhetoric; of a question: asked in order to produce an effect rather than to elicit information.
From Latin rhētoricālis, from Greek rhētorikos (pertaining to an orator, skilled in speaking, rhetorical), from rhētōr (a public speaker, an orator, a pleader in court), from rhēma (a word, a saying, a verb — literally a thing said), from PIE *wer- (to speak, to say). The PIE root *wer- produced Greek rhēma (word, saying) and the agent suffix -tor marking doers. Rhetoric — the art of persuasive speaking — was one of the seven liberal arts
The PIE root *wer- (to speak) connects 'rhetorical' to 'word' (something spoken) and even 'verb' (from Latin 'verbum,' a word — particularly a word that expresses action). So 'rhetoric,' 'word,' and 'verb' are all distant cousins. Aristotle defined rhetoric as 'the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion' — not the art