Terence was born in 190 BC in Carthage. He was a Lybian slave and was taken by his master, the Roman senator Terentius Lucanius, to Rome where he received and excellent education and was later freed.
Terence is know for the elegant language of his plays and was always preferred by the aristocracy. The general public did not want to sit through his plays and often left before they were done for the entertainment that could be found in the Forum. He was often criticized for how close his work was to that of the Greek New Comedy playwright Menander. He never denied this though and seemed rather proud of that fact.
Terence left for Greece in 158 BC to further study Menander and other Greek Theatre forms, but he never returned and tradition says that he was drowned. He was last of the great Roman playwrights, and only 6 of his plays have survived. After he died Roman theatre rapidly declined, the Roman populace being more interested in the spectacle that was staged for them at the Colesium and the Circus Maximus.
