Apuleius, Aelius Aristides and Religious Autobiography

Abstract

This paper argues that Lucius’ narrative of religious conversion in Metamorphoses 11 uses and parodies in its detailed comic presentation of a personal religious testament the similar but seriously presented narrative of Aelius Aristides’ Sacred Tales. In the familiar tradition of sophistic attacks on rivals,  Apuleius is targeting a famous contemporary intellectual and his self-important self-presentation as a specially privileged religious figure.  Since the Sacred Tales were published at some point between A.D. 171 and A.D. 176, this relationship between the two texts would give a late date for the Metamorphoses.