Character guide

Caius Marcius Coriolanus

major

Also known as Marcius, Coriolanus, Caius Marcius, noble Marcius, renowned Coriolanus

A patrician general whose battlefield fury earns him the surname Coriolanus, he returns from Corioli to find Rome's citizens and tribunes already measuring his pride. He cannot flatter, cannot wear humility like a costume, and tells his mother he would rather serve the patricians his way than rule with the people's voice. That refusal — to perform the deference a consul must show — sets the whole tragedy in motion, turning his own city into the enemy he cannot bring himself to fight.

Menenius Agrippa

major

Also known as Menenius, old Menenius, Menenius Agrippa, Worthy Menenius Agrippa

Menenius is the patrician everyone tolerates: a talker, a peacemaker, a man who calls Coriolanus his friend and Rome his family. He tries to keep the general's temper in check — 'Be calm, be calm' — and to keep the tribunes from turning a grain dispute into a coup. His loyalty is genuine but his influence is limited, and watching him fail to bridge the gap between a proud soldier and an angry city is one of the play's quiet heartbreaks.

Tullus Aufidius

major

Also known as Aufidius, Tullus, great Aufidius, Your noble Tullus Aufidius

Aufidius is Rome's mirror-image enemy: a general whose personal hatred of Coriolanus has become almost a form of devotion. He curses his own troops for yielding Corioli, retires to Antium, and lets it be known he would pawn his fortune to be called Coriolanus's vanquisher. That obsessive rivalry — equal parts loathing and admiration — makes him the one figure in the play who truly understands what Coriolanus is, and the one most dangerous when that understanding curdles.

Volumnia

major

Also known as Volumnia Titus Lartius

Volumnia raised her son on stories of blood and honour, and she measures his worth by the wounds he carries home. She pushes him toward the consulship, dismisses his reluctance as squeamishness, and treats his victories as the fulfilment of her own designs. Her love is real and her ambition is fiercer than his, which makes her the play's most unsettling force: the woman who made Coriolanus, and the only one who might be able to unmake him.

Sicinius Velutus

supporting

Also known as Sicinius, Sicinius Menenius, Sicinius Velutus, Sicinius Sir

Sicinius is one half of the tribunician pair that guards the plebeians' hard-won voice against patrician contempt. He watches Coriolanus's triumphal return not with awe but with calculation, noting that a man who cannot 'temperately transport his honours' will lose them soon enough. His patience is his weapon: he lets Coriolanus's own tongue do the work of turning the people against him, then steps in to bar the way to the Capitol.

Junius Brutus

supporting

Also known as Brutus, Brutus Sir, Junius Brutus

Brutus shares the tribuneship with Sicinius and shares his suspicion of Coriolanus's popularity, but his voice is the cooler, more strategic one. He notes how the whole city crowds to see the returning general — nurses, maids, veiled ladies — and concludes that such worship cannot last if the man refuses to ask for it. He and Sicinius work the crowd, frame Coriolanus's contempt as an insult to Rome, and turn a hero's homecoming into a political ambush.

Cominius

supporting

Also known as Cominius Noble Marcius, Cominius Ay, Worthy Cominius

Cominius commands Rome's armies and shares the field with Coriolanus, whose battlefield glory he publicly proclaims by bestowing the name 'Coriolanus' before the assembled city. He prizes old comradeship and the blood he and Marcius have shed together, which makes his later embassy to the exiled warrior especially painful: he urges their shared history and is answered with cold silence. His failed appeal measures how far Coriolanus has turned from Rome, and his report of it hardens the tribunes' and Menenius's sense that only something more intimate can move him.

Virgilia

supporting

Also known as Virgilia Heavens

Virgilia waits at home while her husband wins glory, refusing Valeria's invitations and vowing not to step outside until he comes back from the wars. Where Volumnia glories in blood and honor, Virgilia weeps at his triumph and dreads his danger, a contrast Coriolanus himself notes when he calls her his 'gracious silence.' Her restraint and grief humanize a household otherwise consumed by martial pride, and her presence in the play's domestic scenes sets up the emotional weight she will carry when Rome needs her to plead for it.

Valeria

supporting

Also known as the Lady Valeria, Valeria Fie

Valeria moves easily between Rome's great houses, visiting Volumnia and Virgilia with gossip, warmth, and an eye for the family's boy, whose violent play with a butterfly she recounts with delight. She presses Virgilia to leave her sewing and join the world, and it is she who carries the first word that Coriolanus is besieging Corioli. Her sociable energy throws the women's anxious seclusion into relief, and her later appearance among the petitioners ties her to the play's central question of who can soften Coriolanus's iron will.

Titus Lartius

minor

Also known as Lartius, Titus, valiant Titus

Roman general who fights alongside Coriolanus at Corioli.

First Citizen

minor

Also known as First Citizen We have ever your good word

Leader of the plebeian revolt who argues against Coriolanus's pride.

Second Citizen

minor

Also known as Second Citizen Worthy Menenius Agrippa

Plebeian who supports Menenius's fable of the belly.

First Servingman

minor

Also known as First Servingman Second Servingman

Servant in Aufidius's house who mocks Coriolanus in disguise.

Messenger

minor

Also known as Second Messenger

Bearer of news about the Volscian army's movements.

Senator

minor

Also known as Senator Call Coriolanus

Roman senator who summons Coriolanus to the Capitol.

Adrian

minor

Volscian spy who meets with Nicanor to discuss Roman affairs.

Nicanor

minor

Also known as Volsce Nicanor

Roman traitor who provides intelligence to the Volscians.

First Officer

minor

Officer who arranges the seating for Coriolanus's candidacy.