251 B.C. - 184 B.C.
Titus Maccius Plautus's birth appears to have been no later than 251 B.C. in Sarsina, a town of three thousand in Umbria. He died in or around 184 B.C. and his epitaph from his tombstone is known to us.
His life began surrounded by theater in one fashion or another. As a youth he worked as a handyman in the theater and progressed to acting. Plautus was fairly successful in theater. After his acting career, Plautus worked in several arenas. He was a merchant and also a moneylender. It was as a moneylender that he lost his wealth and became bankrupt. After this financial disaster and during the Second Punic War, he served in the Roman Army for a period of six years.
Upon his return to Rome, Plautus, being too old to act, became a very popular dramatist. During this time he wrote the Saturio and the Addictus, among others. His plays could be seen in production long after his death.
There has been much confusion in the past about which plays were actually Plautus' and which were imitators. It has been stated that Plautus had a habit of "touching up" plays written by others, which would lead to confusion. Later playwrights began to use some of his plays in their own plays. Menaechmi is the play on which Shakespeare based his own work Comedy of Errors.
Plautus was a translator of works of the Greek new Comedy. He always went for the laugh and catered to rough and unseemly tastes of the audiences of his day. Plautus used Latin to its extreme for expressions of abuse and endearments, animated dialogue and banter. His plays had a wide variety of tone but it may be said that his favorite was one of lively, complicated and shady intrigue. Some of his plays include Trinummus, Captivi, Amphitruo, Auluaria, Menaechni, Miles, Mostellaria, and Rudens.
Information taken from
The Oxford Classical Dictionary
The Nature of Roman Comedy: A Study in Popular Entertainment. George E. Duckworth, 2nd ed. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1994.
Three Roman Poets: Plautus, Catallus, Ovid - Their Lives, Times and Works. F.A. Wright, London: George Routledge & Sons, 1938
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