health. Many of Cicero's letters refer with concern to his illnesses. Tiro not only assisted Cicero in secretarial work, but also helped to proofread manuscripts, supervise copyists, and also help in private and financial matters. In 47 BC, for example, Tiro managed the leasing out of Cicero's gardens in Tusculum, oversaw the provision of water to the villa, catalogued the books at Cicero's estate, and tried to reconcile Cicero's daughter Tullia with her husband. He also was the point of contact for Cicero's financial matters: when Cicero divorced Terentia, his friend Titus Pomponius Atticus wrote to Tiro about repayment of Terentia's dowry. He also pursued private ventures: letters to that effect describe such ventures in 44 BC, when he also bought a small farm probably near Puteoli, where Jerome says he died in 4 BC in "his hundredth year". Writings After Cicero's death, Tiro published some of his patron's speeches and letters, along with a collection of jokes and a biography; scholars believe the biography was later used as a main source in the historical works of Plutarch, Tacitus, and Aulus Gellius. He had started collecting and editing Cicero's correspondence by 46 or 45 BC. It seems Tiro also was a prolific writer himself: several ancient writers refer to works of Tiro, including a book on grammar. Aulus Gellius says, "[he] wrote several books on the usage and theory of the Latin language and on miscellaneous questions of various kinds," and quotes him on the difference between Greek and Latin names for certain stars. Asconius Pedianus, in his commentaries on Cicero's speeches, refers to a biography of Cicero by Tiro in at least four books, and Plutarch refers to him as a source for two incidents in Cicero's life. He is credited with inventing the shorthand system of Tironian notes, later used by medieval monks, among others. There is no clear evidence that he did, although Plutarch credits Cicero's clerks as the first Romans to record speeches in shorthand. Tiro in fiction Tiro appears as a recurring character in Steven Saylor's Roma Sub Rosa crime fiction series, where he occupies the role of sometime sidekick to Saylor's investigator hero, Gordianus the Finder. He is the first-person narrator in the three books of Robert Harris's biographical-fiction trilogy of Cicero: Imperium (2006), Lustrum (2009, published in the US as Conspirata), and Dictator (2015). Tiro appears in several books in the SPQR series