| Bacchides | |
|---|---|
| Written by | Plautus |
| Characters | Bacchis I (a prostitute) Slave (of Bacchis) Pistoclerus (son of Philoxenus) Boy (of Cleomachus) Bacchis II (sister of Bacchis I) Lydus (tutor to Pistoclerus) Chrysalus (slave of Nicobulus) Nicobulus (old man) Mnesilochus (son of Nicobulus) Philoxenus Parasite (of Cleomachus) Artamo (slave of Nicobulus) Cleomachus (soldier) |
| Setting | a street in Athens, before the houses of Bacchis I and Nicobulus |
Bacchides is a Latin comedy by the early Roman playwright Titus Maccius Plautus. The title has been translated as The Bacchises, and the plot revolves around the misunderstandings surrounding two sisters, each called Bacchis, who work in a brothel. It includes Plautus' frequent theme of a clever servant outwitting his supposed superior to get money.
The play is probably an adaptation of the play Δὶς Ἐξαπατῶν (Dis Exapaton), meaning Twice Deceiving or The Double Deceiver, by the Greek playwright Menander.[1] The beginning of it is lost, but the outline of the missing scenes can be partly reconstructed from twenty surviving fragments.[2]
One feature of the play which has puzzled scholars is that while Menander's original play was called "The Twice Deceiving", there appear to be three deceptions in the Bacchides. Various solutions to this have been suggested. Several scholars have proposed that the third deception was added by Plautus himself and was not in the original Menander play.[3]
Because of the variety of musical passages, the Bacchides is believed to have been written late in Plautus's career, either before or after the Pseudolus.[3]
The play is set in Athens. The stage set shows two houses, that of Bacchis and that of Nicobulus. Between them is a shrine or altar of Apollo.