"Coriolanus" is largely based on the "Life of Coriolanus" in Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's "The Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans" (1579).The wording of Menenius's speech about the body politic is derived from William Camden's "Remaines of a Greater Worke Concerning Britaine" (1605), where Pope Adrian IV compares a well-run government to a body in which "all parts performed their functions, only the stomach lay idle and consumed all"; the fable is also alluded to in John of Salisbury's "Policraticus" (Camden's source) and William Averell's "A Marvailous Combat of Contrarieties" (1588).