Marcus Tullius Tiro

Marcus Tullius Tiro (died 4 BC) was first a slave, then a freedman, of Cicero from whom he received his nomen and praenomen.

Groebe, in the Realencyclopädie, places it at 103 BC per a statement in Jerome that Tiro died in his hundredth year; this dating, however, is unlikely given that Cicero's letters imply that he was much younger.

[1] Moreover, because valuable slaves usually received their freedom within a few years, Kathryn Tempest in the Encyclopedia of Ancient History, along with William McDermott in Historia, place his birth c. 80 BC.

[2] There is no clear evidence of Tiro's parents or of his status as verna (slave born into a master's household).

[5] His duties included taking dictation, deciphering Cicero's handwriting and managing his table,[6] as well as his garden[7] and financial affairs.

There is no clear evidence that he did, although Plutarch credits Cicero's clerks as the first Romans to record speeches in shorthand.