Lucius Apuleius

Lucius Apuleius, also known as Apuleius of Madaura, was born around 123/124 in Madaura, in present-day northeastern Algeria, and probably died after 170. He was educated in Carthage and Athens, studying grammar and rhetoric. In Rome he worked as a lawyer and later served as a rhetorician, or teacher of public speaking, in his native region; he is also attested as holding a public priesthood. Apuleius wrote a novel as well as philosophical, rhetorical and natural-history works and poetry. In his surviving defense speech, the Apologia, he successfully answered an accusation of magic. He was particularly interested in Eastern cults, including the Egyptian cult of Isis.