INTRODUCTION

the only reference made by Apuleius to his stay at Rome is in the Florida (c. 17), where in a discourse delivered before Scipio Orfitus, proconsul of Africa, he alludes to the days when he frequented the company of Scipio's friends at Rome. On his return to Africa we lose sight of him till his arrival at Oea and the commencement of the curious drama set forth in the Apologia.

Whether he dwelt at Madaura or at Carthage we cannot say with certainty. Probability points to Carthage. Not only would Carthage give greater scope for the display of his peculiar talents, but we know from his own lips that he had made the acquaintance of Lollianus Avitus, the governor of the province.¹ In any case the desire to travel seized him once again. He decided to visit Alexandria,² and it was in the course of his journey thither that the crisis in his life occurred to which we owe the Apologia. For on his journey eastward he fell sick at Oea, the modern Tripoli. In this town there dwelt a wealthy lady, named Aemilia Pudentilla, the widow of Sicinius Amicus, by whom she had two sons, Sicinius Pontianus and Sicinius Pudens. Pontianus was already the friend of Apuleius; he had, as we have seen, made his acquaintance at Athens; an intimacy had sprung up between them, and they had lived under the same roof. Hearing, therefore, of Apuleius' mishap, he called on him at the house of the Appii, friends with whom he was lodging.³ The reason for Pontianus' visit was somewhat remarkable. It was more than a visit of courtesy. His grandfather had been anxious that Pudentilla should take a second husband in the person of his son and her brother-in-law, Sicinius Clarus, and with this end in view threatened to exclude her sons, whose guardian he was, from the possession of their father's property

¹ Apol. 94.
² Apol. 72. The fact that he came to Oea en route proves that he was travelling from some African town.
³ Apol. 72.