Tamayo y Baus, Manuel, 1829-98, Spanish dramatist. Born into a family of actors, Tamayo became one of the most popular and versatile Spanish playwrights of the 19th cent. Among his many successful plays are the historical Locura de amor [the madness of love] (1855) and his tragic masterpiece, Un drama nuevo (1867; tr. A New Drama, 1915). In his contemporary thesis dramas he wrote of social problems.