Lucian

Lucian (Lucianus) was born in Samosata, Commage, Syria. Most of what we know about Lucian's life is derived from his own writings, which cannot always be taken at face value. However, in My Dream Lucian tells that he was apprenticed to his uncle, a stonecutter, after he had stopped going to school. Lucian had shown some talent in modelling cows, horses, and human figures from wax. The apprenticeship lasted one day because he managed to break a slab with his chisel. Lucian of Samosata lived under the Roman Emperors Antoninus Pius, M. Aurelius and Lucius Verus, Commodus, and perhaps Pertinax. Lucian was also one of the first novelists in occidental civilization. In A True Story, a fictional narrative work written in prose, he parodied some fantastic tales told by Homer in the Odyssey and some feeble fantasies that were popular in his time. He anticipated "modern" fictional themes like voyages to the moon and Venus, extraterrestrial life and wars between planets centuries before Jules Verne and H. G. Wells. His novel is widely regarded as an early, if not the earliest science fiction work.