Rhinthon

The son of a potter, he was probably a native of Syracuse, Magna Graecia, and afterwards settled at Tarentum.

He was the author of thirty-eight plays, of which only a few titles (Amphitryon, Heracles, Medea, Orestes) and lines have been preserved, chiefly by the grammarians, as illustrating dialectic Tarentine forms.

The scant fragments of his plays are collected in R. Kassel and C. Austin, Poetae Comici Graeci, vol.

The Amphitruo of Plautus was probably imitated from a different writer (Archippus of Middle Comedy), but illustrates how such subjects were treated.

The hilarotragoedia exercised considerable influence on Latin comedy, the Rhinthonica (or fabula) being mentioned by various authorities amongst other kinds of drama known to the Romans.