For sparkle and malicious with few works of Latin literature can match the only complete Menippean satire which has survived, a skit upon the life and death of Claudius Caesar ascribed in manuscripts which transmit it to Seneca. Transition from prose to verse, a distinctive feature of the Menippean genre, is aptly and amusingly contrived. In general frivolity prevails, but the praise of Nero can be taken seriously and, of course, many of the charges against Claudius, made by Augustus and elsewhere, are in themselves grave enough. Petronius' Satyrica, commonly known as Satyricon, raise abundant problems for literary historians and critics alike. Petronius presents the adventures of a hero, or anti-hero, Encolpius, a conventionally educated young man, without money or morals, and his catamite, Giton, handsome and unscrupulous. Both in incident and character Petronius' novel is highly realistic, indeed startlingly so, if compared with sentimental romances.