Answer:
Fortunato and Montresor are alike in social status. They are both noblemen, evidenced by their coats-of-arms and the fact that they call each other friend.
The actual group of people in the back of the room who have opinions and ideas all their own are known as the literal audience.
Literal audience refers to the type of audience who listens to the speaker's message. For instance, if speech is uploaded to the internet, then the audience would be who views it.
Etymology is the study of the history and origin of words
