Apuleius

Apuleius was a second-century North African writer and intellectual who composed in Latin. He is best known for the Metamorphoses, or The Golden Ass, a novel of magic, travel, social satire and religious transformation, and for his defence speech on a charge of magic.

Apuleius was born in Madauros and died in Roman Carthage. Apuleius studied rhetoric and philosophy and travelled widely before settling in Roman North Africa; his surviving Apology defends him against an accusation of using magic to secure his wealthy marriage and provides rare evidence for provincial elite life.