Quintus Ennius, a poet of surprising versatility and power, was born at Rudiæ, in Calabria, in 239 B. C. [Sidenote: Quintus Ennius.] While he was serving in the Roman army in Sardinia, in 204 B. C., he met with M. Porcius Cato, who took him home to Rome. Here Ennius gave lessons in Greek and translated Greek plays for the Roman stage. He became acquainted with several prominent Romans, among them the elder Scipio Africanus, went to Ætolia as a member of the staff of M. Fulvius Nobilior, and obtained full Roman citizenship in 184 B. C. His death was brought on by the gout in 169 B. C. [Sidenote: Various works of Ennius.] The works of Ennius were many and various, including tragedies, comedies, a great epic poem, a metrical treatise on natural philosophy, a translation of the work of Euhemerus, in which he explained the nature of the gods and declared that they are merely famous men of old times,[1] a poem on food and cooking, a series of _Precepts_, epigrams (in which the elegiac distich was used for the first time in Latin), and satires. His most important works were his tragedies and his great epic, the _Annales_. The tragedies were, like those of Nævius, translations of the works of the great Greek tragedians and their less great, but equally popular, successors. [Sidenote: His dramatic works.] The titles and some fragments of twenty-two of these plays are preserved, from which it is evident that Ennius sometimes translated exactly and sometimes freely, while he allowed himself at other times to depart from his Greek original even to the extent of changing the plot more or less. For the most part, however, the invention of the plot, the delineation of character, and the poetic imagery of his plays were due to the Greek dramatists whose works he presented in Latin form. To Ennius himself belong the skillful use of the Latin language, the ability to express in a new language the thoughts rather than the words of the Greek poets, and also such changes as were necessary to make the Greek tragedies appeal more strongly to a Roman audience. It is impossible to tell from the fragments just what changes were made, but the popularity of the plays, which continued long after the death of Ennius, proves that the changes attained their object and pleased the audience. The titles of two _fabulæ prætextæ_ by Ennius are known, the _Sabine Women_, a dramatic presentation of the legend of the Rape of the Sabines, and _Ambracia_, a play celebrating the capture of Ambracia by M. Fulvius Nobilior. His comedies seem to have been neither numerous nor especially successful.