Lucian

Born around 125 to a lower middle class family in Samosata along the Euphrates, Lucian was apprenticed to his uncle as a sculptor but fled after a botched attempt at the craft, heading to Ionia for an education. He became a travelling lecturer across the Roman Empire, building fame and wealth before settling in Athens for a decade — the period that produced most of his extant works. Writing entirely in ancient Greek despite his likely Syriac mother tongue, he created the comic dialogue as a parody of Socratic tradition and penned A True Story, a tongue-in-cheek satire of tall tales that launch…