A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

PLAUTUS, PLAUTUS. 407
Frag. ~ 74, 82; and ~ 77, which is a testimony such a kind was called an operarius, as we see
to the merits of Plautius; Wieling, Jurispru- from funeral inscriptions. Moreover, if Plautus
dentia Restituta, p. 338.) [G. L.] had previously written plays for the stage, which
PLAU'TIUS LATERA'NUS. [LATERA- must have already gained him some reputation, it
NVS.] is not likely that he should have been compelled on
PLAU'TIUS, NO'VIUS,a Roman artist, in the his return to Rome to engage in the menial office
iepartment of ornamental metal-work (caelatura). of a grinder at a mill for the sake of obtaining a
fie was the maker of one of the most admired of livelihood. On the contrary, it is much more prothose cylindrical bronze caskets (cistae 7l/sticae), bable that the comedies which he composed in the
which are found in tombs in Italy, containing pa- mill, were the first that he ever wrote, and that the
terae, mirrors, and utensils of the bath, such as reputation and money which he acquired by them
strigils. The greatest number of such caskets have enabled him to abandon his menial mode of life.
been found at Praeneste, where some of them seem The age of Plautus has been a subject of no
to have been laid up in the temple of Fortune, as small controversy. Cicero says (Brut. 15) that he
votive offerings from women. The one which bears died in the consulship of P. Claudius and L. Porthe name of Plautius is beautifully engraved with cius, when Cato was censor, that is, in B. c. 1884;
subjects from the Argonautic expedition; a hunt and there is no reason to doubt this express stateis engraved round the lid, which is surmounted by ment. It is true that Hieronsmus, in the Chrothree figures in bronze; and on the lid is the fol- nicon of Eusebius, places his death in the 145th
lowing inscription: on the one side, DINDIA. MA- Olympiad, fourteen years earlier (B. c. 200); but
COLINA. FILEA. DEDIT,-on the other, NOVIOs. the dates of Hieronymus are frequently erroneous,
PLAUTlOS. MED. (me) ROMAI. FECID. From the and this one in particular deserves all the less credit,
style of the workmanship and of the inscription, since we know that the Pseudolus was not reprethe date of the artist is supposed to be about A. U. sented till B. C. 191, and the Baccbides somewhat
500, B. c. 254. (Winckelmann, Gesch. d. Kunst, later, according to the probable supposition of
b. viii. c. 4. ~ 7; Miiller, Arch. d. Kunst, ~ 173, n. Ritschl. But though the date of Plautus's death
4.) [P. S.] seems certain, the time of his birth is a more
PLAU'TIUS QUINTILLUS. [QUINTIL- doubtful point. Ritschl, who has examined the
LIS.] subject with great diligence and acumen in his
PLAU'TIUS RUFUS. [RFvUS.] essay De Aeraet Placuti, supposes that he was born
PLAUTUS, the most celebrated comic poet of about the beginning of the sixth century of the
Rome, was a native of Sarsina, a small village in city (about B. c. 254), and that he commenced
Unibria. Almost the only particulars, which we his career as a comic poet about B. C. 224, when he
possess respecting his life, are contained in a pas- was thirty years of age. This supposition is consage of A. Gellius (iii. 3), which is quoted from firmed by the fact that Cicero speaks (Cato, 14)
Varro. According to this account it would appear of the Pseudolus, which was acted in B. c. 191, as
that Plautus was of humble origin (compare Plan- written by Plautus when he was an old man, an epitince prosapiae lhomo, Minuc. Felix, Oct. 14), and thet which Cicero would certainly have given to no
that he came to Rome at an early age. Varro re- one under thirty years of age; and also by the
lated that the poet was first employed as a work- circumstance that in another passage of Cicero
man or a menial for the actors on the stage (in (quoted by Augustine, De Civ. Dei, ii. 9), Plautus
operis artificumZ scenicorumn), and that with the and Naevius are spoken of as the contemporaries of
nonev which he earned in this way, he embarked P. and Cn. Scipio, of whom the former was consul
in some business, but that having lost all his money in B. c. 222, and the latter in B. c. 218. The
in trade, he returned to Rome, and, in order to principal objection to the above-mentioned date for
gain a living, was obliged to work at a hand-mill, the birth of Plautus, arises from a passage of Cicero,
grinding corn for a baker. Varro further adds in his Tusculan Disputations (i. 1), according to
that while employed in this work (in pistrino), he which it would appear that Plautus and Naevius
wrote three comedies, the Saturio, Addictus, and a were younger than Ennius, who was born in B. c.
third, of which the name is not mentioned. Hiero- 239. But we know that this cannot be true of
nymus, in the Chronicon of Eusebius, gives almost Naevius; and Ritschl has shown that the passage,
the same account, which he probably also derived when rightly interpreted, refers to Livius, and not
from Varro. It would seem that it was only for to Ennius, being older than Naevius and Plautus.
the sake of varying the narrative that he wrote Indeed, Cicero, in another of his works (Beut. ] 8.
" that as often as Plautus had leisure, he was ac- ~ 23),* makes Plautus somewhat (aliqcuanto) older
customed to write plays and sell them." than Ennius, and states that Naevius and Plautus
This is all that we know for certain respecting had exhibited many plays before the consulship of
the life of Plautus; but even this little has not C. Cornelius and Q. Minucius, that is, before B. C.
been correctly stated by most authors of his life. 197. Moreover, from the way in which Naevius
Thus Lessing, in his life of the poet, relates that and Plautus are mentioned together, we may conPlautus early commenced writing plays for the clude that the latter was older than Ennius. Teaediles, and acquired thereby a sufficient sum of rence, therefore, in his Prologue to the Andria (v.
money to enable him to embark in business. It is 18), has preserved the chronological order, when
the more necessary to call attention to this error, he speaks of "Naevium, Plautum, Ennium." We
since, from the great authority of Lessing, it has may safely assign the second Punic war and a few
been repeated in most subsequent biographies of the years subsequently, as the flourishing period of the
poet. The words of Gellius, in operis artificum literary life of Plautus.
scenicorum, have no reference to the composition of It is a curious fact that the full name of the
plays. The artifices seenici are the actors, who
employed servants to attend to various things * Read " cui si aequalis fuerit," and not "cli
which they needed for the stage, and a servant of quum aequalis fuerit."