1. Many thanks to all who read and commented on earlier versions of this piece, both anonymously and otherwise, and to the audience at San Francisco State University for their very useful suggestions. Any errors that remain are solely my responsibility.

2. CH. duas res simul nunc agere decretumst mihi:/et argumentum et meos amores eloquar./non ego item facio ut alios in comoediisl<ui> uidi amoris facere, qui aut Nocti aut Dii/aul Soli aut Lunae miserias narrant suas (‘CHARINUS: I have decided now to do two things at once: I shall speak about the plot and my love. I am not doing just like I have seen others do in comedies by the power of love, where they narrate their miseries either to Night or Day or Sun or Moon’, Merc. 1–5). Characters in positions similar to slaves, such as parasites, can also exhibit knowledge of comedic conventions. As the text for all Plautus quotations I have used Lindsay, Wallace M. (ed.), T. Macci Plauti Comoediae vols. 1–2 (Oxford 1904–05Google Scholar). In the case of Terence 1 have used Kauer, Robert and Lindsay, Wallace M. (eds.), P. Terenti Afri Comoediae (Oxford 1926Google Scholar).

3. The Pseudolus’ Simo comes closest, as will be discussed below (at nn. 18 and 19).

4. In his commentaries, Donatus identifies Terence’s critic as one Luscius Lanuvinus, of whose work only two titles and two lines survive. References to Lanuvinus by name appear in Donatus at Eun. 9 and 10, at Heaut. 16, 22, 27, 30, 31; at Phor. 2 and 6; and, most importantly, at And. 1 and 7—where the contrast between the young Terence and the aged Lanuvinus is made clear: VETERIS poetae M.R. quia senex Luscius edebat fabulas adulescentulo tunc Terenlio (‘because the old Luscius was publishing plays while Terence was then a very young man’). Additionally, Terence later employs the combination uetus poeta to describe his opponent in his prologue to the Phormio (at 1 and 14). In contrast, Terence omits all reference to his opponent’s age and profession in the prologue to the Eunuchus. (Indeed, Terence nearly erases his critic: the poet does not even exist in pronominal form, but only as the unspecified subject of several verbs.) Of course, that the Eunuchus lacks any important senex characters might explain the absence of any reference to his opponent’s age in its prologue, if the connection between Terence’s foe and the generically-aware senes is as important as I argue here. For the text of Donatus see Wessner, P. (ed.), Donatus: Commentum Terenti, vols. 1–2 (Teubner 1962Google Scholar).—Of course, it is a separate question as to whether we can trust Donatus’ identification of the maleuolus uetus poeta as Luscius Lanuvinus. However, the specific identification of Terence’s opponent does not influence the remainder of my argument: what is important is that Terence repeatedly mentions his opponent(s)—whether real or imaginary—in his prologues, simultaneously positioning himself in opposition to any opponent in regard to both age and aesthetic/poetic ideas.

5. PROLOGUS poeta quom primum animum ad scribendum adpulit,/id sibi negoti credidit solum dari,/populo ut placerent quas fecisset fabulas./uerum aliter euenire multo intellegit;/nam in prologis scribundis operam abutitur,/non qui argumentum narret sed qui maleuoli/ueteris poetae maledictis respondeat (‘PROLOGUE: When our poet first set his mind to writing, he believed that this business alone was given him: that the plays that he made be pleasing to the people. But he understands that it turns out very differently; for he uses up his attention in writing prologues, not so that he might relate the plot but so that he might respond to the abuses of a spiteful old poet’, And. 1–7).

6. PROLOGUS turn quod maleuolu’ uetu’ poeta dictitat/repente ad studium hunc se adplicasse musicum,/amicum ingenio fretum, haud natura sua:/arbitrium uostrum, uostra existumatio/ualebit (‘PROLOGUE: Then, what the spiteful old poet keeps saying, that Terence suddenly applied himself to the pursuit of poetry, relying on the intelligence of friends, not on his own nature: your decision, your judgment, will prevail in this matter’, Heaut. 22–26).

7. Northrop Frye employed the term ‘blocking character’ to describe any character (old man, pimp, wife, other slave) who attempts to prevent the young man and the clever slave from achieving their goal. See Frye, Northrop, The Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton 1957), 163–69Google Scholar.

8. The connection between the clever slave and the poet is stated most explicitly by Barchiesi, Marino, ‘Plauto e il “metateatro” antico’, Il Verri 31 [1970], 113–30Google Scholar, at 126f.: ‘Questa tendenza dello schiavo della palliata (e, perché no? della commedia nuova) a unificarsi col poeta—tendenza che, se mai sembrasse indimostrata, verra tra un momento resa esplicita da Pseudolo—si spiega con un complesso di fattori che qui non é possibile analizzare.’ Slater, Sharrock and Stehle develop the idea a bit further. Cf. Slater, Niall, Plautus in Performance: The Theatre of the Mind (Princeton 1985), 177Google Scholar: ‘The clever slaves are the real heroes of these plays: their abilities make the plays possible. Indeed their playwriting abilities (whether literary or improvisatory) are the source of their heroism.’ (Cf. also 174 and 176.) Similar statements can be found in Stehle, Eva, ‘Pseudolus as Socrates, Poet and Trickster’, in David F. Bright and Edwin S. Ramage (eds.), Classical Texts and their Traditions: Studies in Honor of C.R. Trahman (Chico CA 1984), 239–51Google Scholar, at 244. See too Sharrock, A.R., ‘The Art of Deceit: Pseudolus and the Nature of Reading’, CQ 46 (1996), 152–74CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 158. Finally, Marshall, C.W., The Stagecraft and Performance of Roman Comedy (Oxford 2006), 90CrossRefGoogle Scholar, suggests that Plautus may even himself have performed the roles of the slave characters Pseudolus (in the Pseudolus) and Chrysalus (in the Bacchides).

9. That Simo and Chremes are the central characters of their respective plays has already been recognised. See Donatus at Andria praef. 4. Cf. Kruschwitz, Peter, Terenz (Hildesheim 2004), 45Google Scholar; Lefevre, Eckard, Terenz’ und Menanders Heautontimorumenos (Zetemata 91: Munich 1994), 82Google Scholar.

10. Slater (n.8 above), 14.

11. There is also some debate over the effects of self-aware, metatheatrical language. Some scholars, such as C.W. Marshall, argue that theatrical references help reinforce the dramatic pretence. See Marshall, C.W., ‘Theatrical Reference in Euripides’ Electro’, IClS 24–25 (1999–2000), 325–41Google Scholar, at 341. However, most scholars of comedy agree with Muecke, Frances, ‘Plautus and the Theater of Disguise’, ClAnt 5 (1986), 216–29Google Scholar, at 220, who declares that the effect of metatheatrical passages ‘is to unmask the play as play, not to reinforce its fiction’.

12. Wilson, Peter and Taplin, Oliver, ‘The “Aetiology” of Tragedy in the Oresteia’, PCPhS 39 (1993), 169–80Google Scholar. At 169 they observe that ‘presence and absence are not the only appropriate categories; that self-referentiality [their term for metatheatre] can be non-explicit or submerged, and can be detected at various levels or degrees or intensities’. An alternative definition for ‘metatheatre’ is that of Gentili, who uses it to describe plays made from previous plays, as in the Roman process of contaminatio, mixing and adapting several Greek plays to make a Latin one. However, this use of the term has not been adopted. See Gentili, Bruno, Theatrical Performances in the Ancient World: Hellenistic and Roman Theatre (Amsterdam 1979), 15Google Scholar.

13. Regarding faked births see Fantham, Elaine, ‘DOMINA-tricks, or How To Construct a Good Whore from a Bad One’, in Ekkehard Stärk and Gregor Vogt-Spira (eds.), Dramatische Wäldchen: Feschrift fur Eckard Lefevre. zum 65. Geburtstag (Spudasmata 80: Hildesheim 2000), 287–99Google Scholar, at 295: ‘Although Truculentus is the only surviving play to involve a suppositious baby, the fact that Andria makes open sport of the trick proves that this was an established variant in traditional courtesan comedy.’ Creaking doors appear in Plautus at Amph. 496, Aul. 665, Cas. 163 and 874, Cure. 486, Mil. 154, Most. 1062, Poen. 741, Pseud. 130f. In Terence the door creaks at And. 682, Eun. 1029, Heaut. 173 and 613, Hec. 521, Phor. 840. For a discussion of noisy doors in Greek and Roman comedy, see Bader, B., ‘The Psophos of the House-Door in Greek New Comedy’, Antichthon 5 (1971), 35–48Google Scholar.

14. These two senes are also relatively unusual within the Terentian corpus, where an old man’s knowledge of the genre is usually related to the role of the senex, not the seruus callidus. For example, while Micio and Demea in the Adelphoe do employ some of the same language of deception as Simo and Chremes do in their own plays (cf. Micio’s ludo at 639, Demea’s simulare at 734), only Micio betrays even the vaguest awareness of the conventions of their genre; he talks about how other men’s sons trick their fathers, but his—he believes—conceals nothing from him (52–54). Neither do Simo’s fellow senes in the Andria (Chremes and Crito) show any awareness of the genre, with the possible exception of Crito’s prediction that he will be called a sycophanta for bringing news of Glycerium’s citizenship (814–16). Similarly, the Heauton’s Menedemus betrays very little awareness of the comic genre, with the possible exception of his assertion that he cannot act leniently because he has been a harsh father: non possum: sati’ iam, sati’ pater durus fui (439). Finally, the Hecyra’s Laches expresses the belief that he and his wife have become stereotypical characters—although not necessarily ones from a drama: postremo nos iam fabulae/sumu’, Pamphile, ‘senex atque anus’ (‘in the end, Pamphilus, we’ve become a story-line: “the old man and the old woman’”, 620f).

15. For the most part, Plautine characters who show an awareness of Roman comedic conventions are in positions of subordination: slaves, parasites, ancillae, even some adulescentes (such as Charinus, mentioned above at n.2). The few exceptions to this pattern include Simo, Callipho and Ballio in the Pseudolus, as well as Mercury in the Amphitruo (see n.17 below), the soldier Stratophanes in the Truculentus (see n.20 below), the senex Callidamates in the Mostellaria (see nn.19 and 20 below) and the senex Periplectomenus of the Miles, who discusses the stock character types of the adulescens and parasite at 661–68 and uxor dotata (‘well-dowered wife’) at 672–81. (See also n.17 below for his knowledge of the scheming slave.)

16. The surviving fragments of Menandrean comedy provide no evidence for either a Simo or a Chremes in Menander’s comedy either. Interestingly, Simo of Plautus’ Mostellaria may also be aware of his role as an old man in the comedy (if not of the genre’s conventions), given his potential address to the audience at lines 708f. of that play. While Simo is not alone on stage at the time of his speech, it is unlikely that he would address the distant senex Theopropides and the slave Tranio at this point. The parallels suggest that the name Simo may represent a specific type of senex, more aware of his circumstances—or more suspicious of his slaves—than other old men. Alternatively, Sharrock’s recent study casts Simo’s command to Davos at 204f. as an allusion to the activities of the clever slave of the Pseudolus, and perhaps thus a warning for Davos ‘not to try to be Pseudolus’. See Sharrock, Alison, Reading Roman Comedy: Poetics and Playfulness in Plautus and Terence (Cambridge 2009), 144CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17. The old man Periplectomenus of the Miles also recognises the character type of the scheming slave—see 209–13. Mercury, in the Amphitruo, is similarly aware of the role of the comic trope of the running slave—and of his own similarity to it—at 984–87. That Mercury is aware of his own position as a character in a comedy is clear from his address to the audience later in the same speech, at 997f.

18. ‘Like Pseudolus,’ explains Marshall (n.8 above, 141), ‘he appears conscious of his obligation to fulfill and exceed the expectations of his stock type.’

19. Awareness of Roman comedic conventions appears elsewhere in the Pseudolus as well. For example, the senex Callipho also remarks on the conventions of the theatre (specifically, young men freeing their girlfriends) at Pseud. 433–35. Here Callipho seems to have a general idea of typical adolescent behaviour (he uses the Latin word mos) in Roman comedy. Cf. the Plautine Simo’s reflection on his son as one of the worst spendthrift lovers in town (Pseud. 415–17). Even Calidorus recognises character traits of his own role, the adulescens amans, at 238. See also the pimp Ballio’s remarks about young men at 286–88. The senex Callidamates of the Mostellaria also says that the adulescens Philolaches’ behaviour is fitting (solere—see n.20 below) for a young man his age (1158).

20. Other generically-aware Plautine characters who use the term solere to reflect upon the genre as a whole include the slave Libanus at As. 256f. (where callidus appears as well); the parasite Ergasilus at Capt. 778f; and the miles Stratophanes at True. 482–84. See also the senex Callidamates’ remark, discussed above at n.19.

21. Furthermore, as both Wiles and MacCary argue, within the Greek New Comedy tradition, ‘Daos is everywhere a schemer’. Wiles, David, The Masks of Menander: Sign and Meaning in Greek and Roman Performance (Cambridge 1991), 95Google Scholar; Wiles makes reference to MacCary, W.T., ‘Menander’s Slaves: Their Names, Roles and Masks’, TAPhA 100 (1969), 277–94Google Scholar, especially 285–88. Even the name of the slave in the Andria may therefore be significant for his callidus character.

22. In his monologue at And. 206–27 he states, me infensu’ seruat nequam faciam in nuptiis fallaciam (‘hostile [Simo] watches me so I don’t concoct some deception against the marriage’, 212).

23. ego, Pamphile, hoc tibi pro seruitio debeojeonari manibu’ pedibu’ noctesque et dies,/capitis periclum adire, dum prosim tibi;/tuomst, siquid praeter spem euenit, mi ignoscere (‘I, Pamphilus, owe this to you because of my status as servant: to try night and day, with hand and foot, to risk my life, provided that I am of benefit to you; it is your job to forgive me, if anything should occur contrary to our expectation’, And. 675–78). Davos here echoes similar statements he had made about getting Pamphilus out of trouble at 617 (at iam expediam, ‘but now I shall disen tangle you’) and 622 (sed sine paullulum ad me redeam: iam aliquid dispiciam, ‘but permit me to return to myself a bit; now I shall discern something’). Note that Davos is positive about his ability to devise a solution. Pamphilus, in turn, wonders whether his father is playing his role correctly: hoccinest humanum factu aut inceptu? hoccin[est] officium patris? (‘Is this human in deed or inception? Is this the role of a father?’, 236). Pamphilus’ use of the term officium in a theatrical sense is parallelled by several examples in the Plautine corpus: by a lena (As. 173–75) and two slaves (As. 380, Bac. 760).

24. McCarthy argues that Simo is wrong here, and that Davos’ monologue at 206–27 reveals his true concern for Pamphilus. (Which real concern, incidentally, Pamphilus recognises at 964.) See McCarthy, Kathleen, ‘The Joker in the Pack: Slaves in Terence’, Ramus 33 (2004), 100–19CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 117 n.19. Whether or not Simo is correct in interpreting Davos’ potential actions as anti-Simo rather than pro-Pamphilus, his choice of words is important here, consilium—in specific reference to the plan of a clever slave or his contriving counterpart (parasite, slave girl or meretrix)—appears in twelve Plautine comedies, dolus is used to describe the clever slave’s trickery and deception in ten Plautine comedies. And of course the term is even incorporated into the name of Plautus’ quintessential clever slave: Pseudolus. Sharrock (n.16 above), 15 and 141, argues that the word consilium has ‘programmatic force’ here and elsewhere in Terence, and notes that ‘both Simo and Davos use the language of plays directly to refer to other people’s stories’.

25. McCarthy (n.24 above), 104.

26. For example, the Plautine Simo employs the terms sycophanta at 485, dolus at 485 and 540, ludus at 546. Forms of scelus or scelestus are used to describe slaves in eighteen of Plautus’ comedies.

27. Davos later adopts Simo’s term callidus and applies it to himself at 201. Like most Plautine serui callidi, he is not diverted from his plan by a simple threat of bodily harm. For callidus slaves in Plautus see Amph. 268; As. 257; Bac. 643; Cist. 727; Most. 279; Per. 455; Pseud. 385, 725. fallacia is used to describe the clever slave’s machinations at As. 250, 266; Capt. 40, 46, 221, 671, 678; Cist. 540; Mil. 876; Poen. 193, 577, 580, 605, 774; Pseud. 558, 672, 705a, 765, 1055, 1193, 1194, 1195. fallacia machinations by other character types appear at As. 69 (senex); Cas. 860 (matronae); Mil. 192 (a woman of unspecified type); True. 892 (meretrix).

28. ludus/ludifware/deludere appears in every Plautine comedy but the Trinummus. For dolus see nn.24 and 26 above; for simulare and its cognates see n.35 below.

29. Crito himself recognises that he will be called a fraud if he goes to court to claim Glycerium’s inheritance: clamitentlme sycophantam, hereditatem persequi/mendicum (‘let them call me a liar and a beggar for pursuing the inheritance’, 814–16).

30. See Amph. 506; Cure. 467; Men. 260, 283, 1087; Poen. 376, 1052; Pseud. 1197, 1200, 1204; Trin. 815, 860, 892, 1139. The term sycophanta in the context of Roman comedy shares the meaning of the Greek original (‘fig shower’ during a trade embargo, hence ‘false accuser, slanderer’), but has also developed a more general meaning of ‘deceiver, cheat’, and thus comes to be used to describe slaves and other men who adopt a role in order to deceive an opponent. While not a metatheatrical term in Greek comedy, the increased emphasis on deception and trickery found in Roman comedy allows it to develop a metatheatrical valence.

31. At As. 71; Bac. 740, 764, 806; Capt. 521; Mil. 767; Per. 325; Poen. 425, 654; Pseud. 425, 527, 572, 672; Trin. 867, 928.

32. More precisely, at Bac, 214; Capt. 52, 54, 1029; Cas. 6, 8, 12, 17, 84, 1006; Men. 72, perhaps 1077; Merc. 1007; Most. 510, perhaps 937, 1181; Per. 788; Poen. 8, 551, 1370; Pseud. 2, 388, 564, 720, 754, 1334; Rud. perhaps 355, 1421; St. perhaps 690; Trin. 16, 19; True. 967.

33. Simo also uses dissimulare in regard to his own son’s behaviour (i.e. his hidden love for Glycerium): ihi turn exanimatus Pamphiluslbene dissimulatum amorem et celatum indicat (‘then Pamphilus, terrified, revealed a love well pretended and concealed’, 131f.). Sosia, on the other hand, asks Simo why he is pretending (simulas, 48) to prepare for an actual wedding when he is merely using the sham preparations to gauge Pamphilus’ true feelings for Glycerium. Finally, Pamphilus himself asks why his father is pretending to set up a marriage: quid igitur sibi uolt pater? quor simulat? (‘What does my father want for himself then? Why does he pretend?’, 375).

34. Cf. And. 236 (n.23 above), Heaut. 580: SY. homini’frugi et temperanti’functu’s offwium? (‘SYRUS: Have you performed the role of a temperate and moderate man?’)

35. For example, in the first surviving scene of the Bacchides, the meretrix Bacchis tells the adulescens Pistoclerus to pretend to love her (simulato me amare, 75) in order that they may fool the soldier who wants to hire her sister (Bacchis II). The language of pretending and (dis)simulating is especially loaded in any play, and here Bacchis is like a director telling an actor how to act in their miniature performance aimed at deceiving their audience of one desirous soldier. (Pistoclerus himself adopts such performance language at 75.) Otherwise, simulare (or its compounds or nounform simulatio) appears—in specific reference to acting as part of a deceptive play-within-a-play performance (designed to deceive a senex, leno or miles in all cases but the Amphitruo)—at Amph. 115, 200, 874, 999; As. 581, perhaps 796; Capt. 224, perhaps 1007; Cure. 391; Ep. 194, 373; Men. 832; Mil. 152, 260, 792, 796, 908, 909, 1163, 1170, 1181; Most. 1071; Per. 84, 677; Poen. 112, 599, 600, 1106; Truc. 18, 86, 390, 394, 464, 472, 500. Forms of simulare et al. are used in a more general sense of ‘pretending’ at Aul. 463; Cist. 96; Men. 146, 608; Pseud. 73; Rud. 1399; Sti. 77, 84; Trin. 633.

36. Lefèvre, Eckard, Terenz’ und Menanders Andria (Zetemata 132: Munich 2008), 139Google Scholar: ‘In 164, 197, 198 und 208 begegnen plautinische Termini im Blick auf den Sklaven: malus, fallaciae, cattidus, astu; umgekehrt verwahrt sich Simo in 203 dagegen, von Davos verspottet zu werden (deludier). Mit diesem Stichwort werden die beiden Personen gewissermaßen in die Tradition der plautinischen Komödie gestellt. Dasselbe ist der Fall, wenn Simo zu Recht feststellt inrideor (500)…. Auch das von Mysis verwendete Prädikat o hominem audacem! (769) angesichts des ris-kanten Vorgehens ihres Mitsklaven klassifiziert diesen in plautinischer Weise.’

37. Hunter, Richard L., The New Comedy of Greece and Rome (Cambridge 1985), 77CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Or, as McCarthy puts it (n.24 above, 104), ‘…the way that Simo goes wrong is to read Davos as if he were a Plautine slave, thus underestimating both the slave’s loyalty and his own confusion produced by the “farcical” thinking of trickery, where everything that happens—even the birth of a child—evaporates into illusion on closer inspection.’

38. sed quasi poeta, tabulas quom cepit sibi./quaerit quod nusquam gentiumst, reperit tamen,/facit illud ueri simile quod mendacium est,/nunc ego poeta fiam: uiginti minasjquae nunc nusquam sunt gentium, inueniam tamen (‘but just like a poet, when he takes up tablets for himself, seeks what’s nowhere on earth, nevertheless he discovers it, and makes what’s a lie similar to the truth. Now I become a poet: nevertheless I shall find twenty minae that are now nowhere on earth’, Pseud. 401–05). Cf. the unusual plot-devising matrona Myrrhina in the Casina, who declares nec fallaciam astutiorem ullu’ fecit/poeta atque ut haec est fabre facta ab nobis (‘nor has any poet created a more artful trick than this one skilfully created by us’, 860f.).

39. Goldberg, Sander M., Understanding Terence (Princeton 1986), 20Google Scholar. Compare Hunter (n.37 above), 79: ‘It is a pleasing irony that Simo is deceived because he refuses to take dramatic conventions at their face value; nothing but trouble can come from mixing the real world with the world of the theatre.’ Indeed, the theme of self-deception is common in Terence, since, along with Simo and Chremes, Demea of the Adelphoe deceives himself as well: Demea believes that the son he has raised, Ctesipho, is much better behaved than Aeschinus, the son raised by his brother. However, Aeschinus has violently kidnapped a flute-girl for Ctesipho, while he himself has fallen in love with a poor, but citizen, girl. Cf. Blänsdorf, Jürgen, ‘Die Komodienintrige als Spiel im Spiel’, A&A 28 (1982), 131–54Google Scholar, at 148.

40. Sharrock (n.16 above), 148.

41. Cf. Simo at 532: atque adeo in ipso tempore eccum ipsum obuiam (‘and indeed, there he is himself coming to meet me in the nick of time’). And Simo again at 590: hoc audi: ut hinc te intra ire iussi, opportune hie fit mi obuiam (‘listen to this, when I ordered you to go inside from here, this guy opportunely appeared to meet me’).

42. Blänsdorf (n.39 above), 147: ‘Simo hat mit fortschreitender Verwicklung immer hartnäckiger an dem Vorurteil festgehalten, daß alle Behauptungen der Gegenseite Fiktion sind (V,3,4), gleichzeitig ist er krankhaft mißtrauisch und fiirchtet nichts so sehr, wie betrogen zu werden (v.902, vgl. v.203)’.

43. Sharrock (n.16 above), 71.

44. Sharrock (n.16 above), 269: ‘it is the perfect, understated, metatheatrical ending to this highly self-conscious play.’ In addition, Sharrock observes (252, 254 and 256) that because the final speaker in any play is in a position of power, Davos thereby recovers some of the ‘status and control’ (both within the play and over the audience) that he had lost in his continuing battle with Simo.

45. audireque eorumst operae pretium audaciam (‘it is worth the trouble to hear about their audacity’, And. 217); et fingunt quondam inter se nunc fallaciam/ciuem Atticam esse hanc (‘and now they are fabricating a trick between themselves that she is an Athenian citizen’, And. 220f).

46. Shipwrecks are rather rare in Roman comedy, appearing only in Plautus’ Rudens, but a shipwreck was also mentioned in Menander’s Perikeiromene. However, the recognition of an orphaned or lost child as a citizen occurs in Plautus’ Captivi, Casina, Cistellaria, Curculio, Epidicus, Menaechmi, Poenulus, Rudens, as well as in Terence’s Eunuchus and Phormio. Like Davos, the audience could also recognise the generic conventions. See Sharrock (n.16 above), 145: it is presented to us here as a complete fiction, but Terence’s audience would hear the description as precisely the kind of plot they are always being offered, maybe even as the plot of a particular play which is an important intertext for this one.’ As for Davos’ word choice, Gowers, Emily, ‘The Plot Thickens: Hidden Outlines in Terence’s Prologues’, Ramus 33 (2004), 150–66CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 154, observes, ‘fabulae also means “plot”, a hint that this is indeed the lost story-line, one whose veracity Terence will withhold till the end of the play’. Ortwin Knorr, ‘Metatheatrical Humor in the Comedies of Terence,’ in Kruschwitz, Peter, Ehlers, Widu-Wolfgang and Felgentreu, Fritz (eds.), Terentius Poeta (Zetemata 127: Munich 2007), 167–74Google Scholar, at 169, argues that Davos’ use of the term at 224 sets up Simo’s repetition of fabula (in regard to Crito’s announcement at 925) and thereby ‘serves two functions: First, it introduces the theme that everything in this play that seems staged or, in other words, everything that smacks of dramatic convention is, in fact, “reality”. Secondly, Davus’ comment foreshadows the typical happy ending, the recognition of Glycerium as the daughter of the wealthy Athenian Chremes (933).’

47. Sharrock (n.16 above), 147.

48. Lefevre (n.36 above), 137.

49. McCarthy (n.24 above), 111.

50. PA. tube solui, obsecro./Sl. age fiat. (‘PAMPHILUS: Order that he be released, please. SIMO: Let it be done’, And. 955f.)

51. Goldberg, Sander M., ‘The Dramatic Balance of Terence’s Andria’, C&M 33 (1981–1982), 135–43Google Scholar, at 137; Jr.Richardson, L., ‘The Moral Problems of Terence’s Andria and Reconstruction of Menander’s Andria and Perinthia’, GRBS 38 (1997) 137–85Google Scholar, at 176.

52. Kruschwitz (n.9 above), 47: ‘Zusammengefaßt darf man wohl sagen, daß Simo eine der am negativsten gezeichneten Vaterfiguren ist, die Terenz in seinen Werken geschaffen hat.’

53. In addition, the senex Menedemus himself also reveals a limited awareness of Roman comic conventions—namely the role of the strict father, at lines 99–101 (coepi non humanitus/neque ut animum decuit aegrotum adulescentuli/tractare, sed ui et uia peruolgata patrum, ‘I didn’t start off kindly, nor as was proper to treat the sick spirit of a young man, but with force and the common method of fathers’) and 439 (non possum: sati’ iam, sati’ pater durus fui, ‘I cannot: I’ve been a harsh father enough already’), as Hunter (n.37 above, 99) observes. Furthermore, Syrus seems to be marked for deception and trickery by his very name. According to Donatus at Ad. 1.1, unfaithful slaves are named Syrus or Geta, while faithful slaves are named Parmeno: hinc seruus fidelis Parmeno, infidelis Syrus uel Geta. Wiles (n.22 above), 93, notes that it is true at least in Greek New Comedy, and that these two unfaithful slaves (as well as Daos) are marked by ethnic names. Although Donatus is not explicit, the perspective from which a slave’s (in)fidelity is judged seems to be that of the head of the household—thus the senex in the Roman palliata. Leaving aside the Greek New Comedies, a glance at the only surviving examples of such characters in Roman comedy shows that deception and/or infidelity is a frequent characteristic of the Syrian and Getan slaves, and that, for the most part, Donatus’ classifications hold true.

54. Compare his use of officium (n.34 above) to describe what various roles involve. Similarly, Syrus’ speech at 402 (immo ut patrem tuom uidi esse habitum, diu etiam duras dabit, ‘rather, I have seen how your father is, and he will give you difficult [parts] for a long time’), with its understood object partes (with duras)—a word frequently employed with a theatrical connotation to mean ‘role, theatrical part’—suggests he is aware of Clinia’s status as an actor performing on stage. (Syrus may also use parte to refer to Chremes’ role at 798, but Kauer and Lindsay obelise the line.) Elaine Fantham, Comparative Studies in Republican Latin Imagery (Phoenix Supplement X: Toronto 1972), 33, demonstrates that pars was used in a theatrical sense from at least Plautus’ time—see Merc. 276, and Mil. 811. The theatrical metaphor is popular in Terence, who uses it explicitly twice in the Eunuchus (151, 354), but also in ellipsis at Heaut. 402 and Ad. 880.

55. See n.27 above.

56. Lowe, J.C.B., ‘The Intrigue of Terence’s Heauton Timorumenos’, RhM 141 (1998), 163–71Google Scholar, at 164f.: ‘This is the first instance of a technique which is used several times in the play, to avoid repetition, to keep the audience in suspense and to emphasize the cleverness of the scheming slave; Syrus declines to give details of his plan and invests it with an air of mystery.’ In addition, Sharrock (n.16 above, 149) notes that Davos also refuses to divulge his plan at And. 705–07, but that the clever slave’s very refusal to reveal his plan is a part of the comic tradition: Epidicus (at Ep. 376, 665), Palaestrio (Mil. 810) and Pseudolus (Pseud. 388, 720) all refuse to share their plots for one reason or another.

57. See Most. 1094–1180. The scene with Daos is the longest surviving fragment of Menander’s Perinthia. Also see Plautus’ Rudens 691–885, where two girls take shelter at an altar in an attempt to escape their owner, the leno Lycus.

58. The lasting popularity of such images is illustrated in the widely differing dates of production for several major examples of the type. For example, the British Museum has several such items, including a late 4th-century BCE version in terracotta and a lst-century CE version in bronze. The Louvre has an early 4th-century BCE version in terracotta as well. The Getty Villa in Malibu even has a 1 st-century CE bronze incense burner in the shape of a slave atop an altar.

59. I would like to thank Michael Anderson for the phrasing here.

60. See n. 13 above for passages alluding to creaking doors in Roman comedy.

61. Chremes also employs the term fallacia to describe Syrus’ tricks at 849 and 1041. However, Syrus is the first to use the term (in Chremes’ presence) at 513, and he repeats it at 596. In the same vein are Chremes’ remarks at 469–71 and 545–47. At 469–71 he tells Menedemus to permit himself to be deceived by Syrus’ tricks, and thus expresses his knowledge of comic conventions: quiduis potiu’ quam quod cogitas:/per alium quemuis ut des, falli te sinas/techinis per seruolum (‘[do] anything rather than what you intend: confer it [i.e., the money] through anyone else you like, and allow yourself to be deceived by that little slave with his tricks’). Compare lines 545–47, where Chremes asks Syrus if Menedemus’ slave is planning something (fabricam fingit) against Menedemus to help his son Clinia: nonne ad senem aliquam fabricam fingit?…/at te adiutare oportet adulescentuli/causa (‘isn’t he creating some trick against the old man?… But it is proper for you to help for the sake of the young man’). (Note the senex/adulescens contrast in this and the quotation from 533–35.) Also see line 495, where Menedemus remarks that Chremes has sensed that their sons have begun their deception as Chremes had predicted (sensisti illos me incipere fallere, ‘you realised that they were beginning to deceive me’).

62. See n.38 above. Sharrock (n.16 above, 160) observes that Chremes is too susceptible to theatrical realism, since he actually believes that Clinia is only acting—under Syrus’ direction—when he rejoices upon learning that he is able to marry Antiphila. Connections to the play-within-a-play theme can also be seen in Chremes’ use of simulare at 901 and simulatio at 943. Compare Syrus’ adsimularier at 716.

63. Lefevre (n.8 above), 81: ‘Der Zuschauer…begriff, daß Chremes ein Hohlkopf und Syrus ein Tausendsassa des Pläneschmiedens sei.’

64. As Hunter (n.36 above, 100) remarks, ‘Chremes in fact is as much concerned with appearances as with truth (vv.469–89, 572–8), even to the extent of forcing an elaborate and ridiculous charade on the unhappy Menedemus (vv.940ff.). It is thus particularly appropriate that Chremes himself is fooled simply because he refuses to believe what is in fact the truth about the love affairs of the two young men (cf. vv.709–12).’ Lowe (n.56 above, 170) notes that truth is also used to deceive a senex in the Bacchides, another comedy based on a Menandrean original (in addition to the Andria and perhaps the Heauton as well).

65. Lowe (n.56 above), 169: ‘We should observe the care with which the dramatist has depicted Chremes as caught off guard. Thanks to Syrus’ ingenuity, Chremes still has no inkling of his son’s affair with Bacchis; and his preoccupation with “schemes” to deceive Menedemus makes it more plausible that he should fail to recognize that Syrus is really scheming against him.’

66. Blänsdorf (n.38 above), 147: ‘Das turbulente Spiel der Verwicklungen und Verwechslungen, das Chremes selbst ausgelöst hat, geht nicht nur zu seinem Schaden aus, sondern offenbart auch mehr and mehr seinen Charakter.’

67. Cf. Lefèvre (n.9 above), 87: ‘In beiden Fallen wird Chremes bloßgestellt; er erscheint als der Tor, der die Machenschaften der Jungen nicht durchschaut, obwohl er als Alleswisser auftritt.’

68. CL. Syro ignoscas uolo/quae mea causa fecit. CH.fiat (‘CLITIPHO: I want you to forgive Syrus for the things he did on my behalf. CHREMES: Let it be done’, Heaut. 1066L).

69. He rejects the red-haired daughter of his father’s friend and suggests another citizen girl whom he finds desirable: immo, quandoquidem ducendast, egomet habeo propemodumlquam uolo…Archonidi huiu’ filiam (‘rather, since a girl must be married, I almost have someone whom I want…the daughter of this Archonides’, Heaut. 1064f.).

70. In the Trinummus, Callicles and Megaronides decide to trick the adulescens Lesbonicus in order to prevent him from bankrupting himself. They hire a sycophanta to pretend to be a messenger from Lesbonicus’ father Charmides. While describing the Sycophant’s character type, Megaronides calls him a sycophantam…de foro (‘trickster from the forum’, 815), mendaciloquom aliquem…/falsidicum, confidentem (‘some lie-telling, false-speaking, presumptuous guy’, 769f.). The same terms would describe the seruus callidus, or any other character skilled in deception. At 787 the senex Callicles even admits in a metatheatrical fashion that engaging in deception is not appropriate to someone of his age: quamquam hoc me aetatis sycophantari pudet (‘although it shames me to deceive at this age’).

71. Moodie, Erin K., Metatheater, Pretense Disruption, and Social Class in Greek and Roman Comedy (Diss. Pennsylvania 2007Google Scholar). The pattern extends throughout the corpora of both Plautus and Terence, although metatheatrical commentary and self-aware remarks are less common in Terentian comedy than in Plautine comedy. Nevertheless, the pattern stands.

72. McCarthy (n.24 above), 116 n.10.

73. As Sharrock (n.16 above, 89) declares, ‘It must be significant that Terence constantly stresses the age difference between himself and his adversary. A conflict between a young man and an old man, which the young man must win, is obviously a good programmatic image for the content of Comedy.’

74. The Prologus later adds, nam nunc nouas qui scribunt nil parcunt seni:/siquae laboriosast, ad me curritur;/si lenis est, ad alium defertur gregem./in hac est pura oratio. experimini/in utramque partem ingenium quid possit meum./[si numquam auare pretium statui arti meae/et eum esse quaestum in animum induxi maxumum,/quam maxume seruire uostris commodis:]/exemplum statuite in me, ut adulescentuli/uobis placere studeant potiu’ quam sibi (‘for now those who write new plays do not spare an old man: if any [play] is difficult, they run right over to me; if it is mellow, it is brought to another troupe. In this play the speech is pure. You all test what my talent can do in either direction. [I never greedily established the price for my art, and I took it into my head that it was the greatest profit to serve your interests as much as possible:] establish a precedent in me, so that little adolescents might desire to please you rather than themselves’, Heaut. 43–52).

75. id isti uituperant factum atque in eo disputant/contaminari non decere fabulas./faciuntne intellegendo ut nil intellegant?/qui quom hunc accusant, Naeuium Plautum Ennium/accusant quos hic noster auctores habet,/quorum aemulari exoptat neglegentiam/potius quam istorum obscuram diligentiam (‘those men criticise that this was done and maintain that it is not proper to mix plays. Do they do this in the understanding that they understand nothing? Since when they accuse him, they accuse Naevius, Plautus and Ennius, whom our author considers his exemplars, the carelessness of whom he prefers to emulate, rather than the unintelligible attentiveness of those men’, And. 15–21).

76. Gowers (n.46 above), 152.

77. non qui argumentum narret sed qui maleuoli/ueteris poetae maledictis respondeat (‘not so that he might relate the plot but so that he might respond to the abuses of a spiteful old poet’, And. 6f.); de(h)inc ut quiescant porro moneo et desinant/male dicere, malefacta ne noscant sua (‘I warn them that from now on they should be quiet and stop cursing [him], lest they recognise their own misdeeds’, And. 22f); de illi(u)s peccatis plura dicet quom dabit/alias nouas, nisi finem maledictis facit (‘about whose own mistakes he [Terence] will say more when he presents other new [plays], unless [the critic] puts a stop to his curses’, Heaut. 33f.).

78. See n.75 above and cf. Heaut. 16–21: nam quod rumores distulerunt maleuoli/multas contaminasse Graecas, dum facitlpaucas Latinos: factum id esse hie non negatlneque se pigere et deinde facturum autumat./habet bonorum exemplum quo exemplo sibillicere [id] facere quod illi fecerunt putat (‘for spiteful men have spread rumours that he [Terence] has contaminated many Greek plays, while producing few Latin ones: he does not deny that he did that, and asserts that he is not ashamed and will do it again. He has the example of good men, by which example he thinks that it is permitted for him to do what they did’).

79. Kruschwitz (n.9 above, 71) notes that Syrus can be counted as a winner in his play because he acts with good intent, without regard for his own interests, and does so unasked. Furthermore, he is both quick-witted and responsive when things go badly: ‘Syrus bewegt im Stück vieles, meistens ungefragt und ungebeten, aber stets in guter Absicht und ohne Rücksicht auf Konsequenzen für ihn selbst. Darüber hinaus erweist er sich als schlagfertig und schnell reaktionsfähig, sollten sich die Dinge für ihn kurzfristig zum Schlechteren wenden.’ Although Lefèvre argues that Syrus’ actions are not a sign of agility but rather a result of Terence’s careless construction of the play, Lowe has demonstrated the overall unity of the deception theme within the play. See Lefévre (n.9 above), 80, and Lowe (n.56 above), 170.

80. Additionally, Syrus’ use of scelestus links him to the Plautine tradition of the clever slave, as was discussed above at n.26.

81. Sharrock (n. 16 above), 151, even casts this manoeuvre as a trick, noting that Syrus, although ‘thrown off-course at the crisis of the play, …manages to recover enough to play another trick’ on Chremes.

82. Furthermore, that Syrus manages to deceive his younger master Clitipho by playing off his fears about the common comic conceit of the exposed and adopted child suggests that Syrus and Clitipho are aware of their status as characters in a comedy.

83. While Plautus may have enhanced the poet-like aspects of some of his slave and parasite figures, he was not exactly presenting himself as slave-like (unless Marshall’s supposition that Plautus played the parts of both Pseudolus and Chrysalus is correct—see n.8 above). Regardless, the situation is nevertheless different in Terence’s case, for Terence makes his prologues address the issues of what it means to adapt plays and compete for public funding and audience acclaim. Terence as a person or persona enters the theatrical space in a way that Plautus never had, and it is this facet of his drama which allows him to portray his major critic as a blocking character, and obliquely reference his own position as a clever young inventor of plots. See Ismene Lada-Richards, ‘Authorial Voice and Theatrical Self-Definition in Terence and Beyond: The Hecyra Prologues in Ancient and Modern Contexts’, G&R 51 (2004), 55–82.

84. This is true regardless of whether Terence himself had been a slave. See McCarthy (n.24 above), 115: ‘But I think there’s another kind of gain to be had from the opportunity that Terence presents to help us escape from the circularity of our thinking, in which we make up our minds about the interpretation of text and what it says about status by knowing the status of the author.’ However, as a newcomer to the comic stage Terence is likely to have been at a disadvantage to more established poets like the maleuolus uetus poeta.

85. Gowers (n.46 above), 154: ‘In the play the repeated account of an unknown person cast ashore and then given a kind welcome (e.g. hanc eiectam…/…recepisse, 223f.) offers an inviting model for Terence’s own charitable reception. The choice at the end of the prologue—drive the plays away or go on watching them (spectandae an exigendae sint, 27)—is the crux of the Andrian girl’s fortunes too; the final decision to embrace her is a displaced focus for the aesthetic appreciation of Andria the play. The notion of a beautiful young person vulnerable to acceptance or rejection according to society’s whim is of course also rehearsed in Terence’s ancient biography.’ Gowers does however go on to note that there is every possibility that Terence’s biography was entirely based on his comedies (ibid. 155): ‘We will never know to what extent Terence’s life-story was, as so often in antiquity, simply constructed out of the fabric of his plays, but there is an especially striking similarity between his own precarious fortunes and those so narrowly avoided by his first play and its beautiful eponymous heroine.’

86. Gowers (n.46 above), 154.

87. Gowers (n.46 above), 156.

88. Clever slaves are associated with youth regardless of their actual age because of their alliance with their young masters against the older lenones and senes. The slaves are usually imagined to be older than the adulescentes whom they assist. The only potential clue about the age of Syrus in the Heauton comes in a remark by Chremes: quiduis potiu’ quam quodcogitas:/per alium quemuis ut des, falli te sinas/techinis per seruolum (‘[do] anything rather than what you intend: confer it [i.e., the money] through anyone else you like, and allow yourself to be deceived by that little slave with his tricks’, 469–71). McGlynn, Patrick, Lexicon Terentianum (London 1963–67), 166f.Google Scholar, lists all uses of seruolus in the Terentian corpus. The term appears six or seven times, never in respect to a slave whose age is specified either as young or old. The term appears eleven times in Plautine comedy as well, twice in reference to characters who are known to be relatively young: Mercury (Amph. 987), and the sisters Adelphasium and Anterastilis (Poen. 1094). As for the advanced age of the clever slave: Syrus in the Adelphoe does make reference to his own old age, as well as to carrying around the adulescens Ctesipho when he was still a baby at 562f. However, Marshall—who believes that Roman comedy was performed by masked actors—notes that in the masking tradition of Greek New Comedy ‘All of the masks with dark beards (masks 22–7) are slave masks; significantly, the one mask Pollux lists in this category with white hair [which the “old man” masks also share] (mask 21) represents a freedman’ (Marshall [n.8 above], 130). Thus Greek slaves at least were portrayed as younger than their senex-equivalent masters. Furthermore, because some Plautine slaves are presented as adulescentes (such as Tyndarus in the Captivi), they may not wear beards—and therefore be more similar to the beardless young men of the Greek tradition. While the Captivi is indeed a special case—Tyndarus will be recognised as free-born at the end—it seems that a seruus callidus like Davos or Syrus need not be significantly older than his young master.

89. The contrast also appears in the opposing views of fatherhood expressed by Chremes and his son Clitipho at 200–10 and 213–22. Chremes had also earlier guessed Menedemus’ age to be about sixty at 62f: annos sexaginta natus es/aut plus eo, ut conicio (‘you are sixty, or more than that, I gather’).

90. Cf. Wright, John, Dancing in Chains: The Stylistic Unity of the Comoedia Palliata (Rome 1974), 150f.Google Scholar: ‘For Terence, plot, characterisation, and realism are all-important. He writes, by and large, as if the comic tradition at Rome never existed.’

91. Knorr (n.46 above), 169.

92. Terence does seem to drop this angle of attack in his other comedies—probably because the method was less appropriate to the contents of the plays. The Andria, of 166 BCE, was Terence’s first play, and was therefore important for establishing his dramatic and artistic skill for the Roman audience. The Heauton of 163 BCE was apparently his third—the didascalia of the Hecyra list that play’s first attempted (and failed) performance as occurring in 165 BCE. Perhaps the reprise of the rhetoric of the Andria in the Heauton represents a return to a successful formula after the failure of the Hecyra. (Because the original prologue to the Hecyra does not seem to have survived, we cannot be sure of its contents. In any case, the play focuses more on the behaviour of the adulescens than on that of his father, so the anti-senex/uetus poeta angle might not have been appropriate.) But as was mentioned earlier (see n.4 above), references to the uetus poeta do appear in the prologues to the Eunuchus and Phormio (both from 161 BCE). However, the Eunuchus features a senex character (unnamed) only briefly, at the very end. The Phormio again features an inventive lowstatus character (the eponymous parasite), as well as multiple senes, but the metatheatrical language belongs nearly always to Phormio or the slave Geta. While the rhetoric continues in the prologues to these two plays (Terence emphasises that the uetus poeta had attacked him first at both Eun. 6 and Phor. 19) Terence’s metatheatrical focus lies elsewhere than the senex characters.