Short answers, pulled from the story.
Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius lived during the early fifth century, a period known as late antiquity. His given name remains unrecorded in surviving manuscripts, so only his three surnames appear in the earliest texts that have endured to modern times.
Evidence points toward North Africa, which belonged to the Latin-speaking portion of the empire. Macrobius himself stated at the beginning of his Saturnalia that he was born under a foreign sky, fueling centuries of speculation about his true birthplace.
Macrobius wrote his most influential book as a commentary on Cicero's Dream of Scipio and composed The Saturnalia consisting of seven books detailing discussions held at the house of Vettius Agorius Praetextatus. A third work titled On the Differences and Similarities of the Greek and Latin Verb no longer exists in full but survives through abstracts and excerpts.
Historians have tried to match the author Macrobius with specific officials recorded in the Codex Theodosianus where one candidate held the office of praetorian prefect of Spain between 399 and 400. Another served as proconsul of Africa in 410 while a third individual named Macrobius appears as a praepositus or lord chamberlain in 422.
In astronomy, it gives the diameter of the Sun as twice the diameter of the Earth and early medieval manuscripts often included maps showing the antipodes derived from Ptolemaic concepts of a spherical Earth. A 12th-century manuscript from Southern France contains 50 folios of parchment measuring 23.9 by 14 centimeters that resides today at Copenhagen's Det Kongelige Bibliotek under the number NKS 218 4°.