Lucian c.117-c.180AD
Greek satirist, rhetorician and writer

Born in Samosata, Syria, he practised as an advocate in Antioch, and wrote and recited show speeches for a living, travelling through Asia Minor, Greece, Italy and Gaul. Having made his name and fortune, he settled in Athens, and there produced a new form of literature, the humorous dialogue. The old faiths, philosophy and literature were all changing, and Lucian found many targets for his satire. The absurdity of retaining the old deities without the old belief is brought out in such works as the Deorum Dialogi ('Dialogues of the Gods'), Mortuorum Dialogi ('Dialogues of the Dead') and Charon. Whether philosophy was more disgraced by the shallowness or the vices of those who now professed it, is discussed in his Symposium, Halieus, Bion Prasis, Drapetae and others. Vera Historia ('True History') parodies the fantastic adventure tales of the 'new' literature. His style, which is notable for the purity of his Attic Greek, is straightforward and elegant. A Selected Works was published in 1965, edited by B P Reardon.

Bibliography: J Bompaire, Lucian �crivain (1958)