c. 446-386 BC
Read our guide to Aristophanes. Aristophanes was the foremost poet of Athenian Old Comedy. Eleven of his forty or so comedies survive complete; they mix fantasy, satire of politicians and philosophers, burlesque of tragedy and the gods, and lyric choruses.
Read our article on Aristophanes for his life and the plays in summary; the pages below carry the texts themselves.