Tricky slave

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Actor playing a slave and wearing a comic mask. Bronze statuette, early 3rd century CE.

The tricky slave is a clever, lower-class person who brings about the happy ending of a comedy for the lovers. He is cleverer than the upper-class people about him, both the lovers and the characters who block their love, and typically also looking out for his own interests; in the New Comedy, the tricky slave or dolosus servus aimed to get his freedom by assisting his young master in love.^[1]

Besides the actual slaves of classical theater, he also appears as the scheming valet in Rennaissance comedy, called the gracioso in Spanish. The zanni of Commedia dell'arte are often tricky slaves, as are Jeeves in P. G. Wodehouse's work and Figaro.

In fairy tales, the same function is often fulfilled by fairy godmothers, talking animals, and like creatures.

Northrop Frye identified him as a central portion of the Myth of Spring, comedy and a type of eiron character.