GOLDEN ASS, The. The phoses' of Apuleius, or The Golden Ass,' as they are popularly called, are the most famous, if not the best, of the Milesian tales—collec tions of stories which were intended to tickle the fancy with voluptuous pictures by being re lated in a brief, witty manner. Such tales en joyed universal favor in antiquity and were probably the prototypes of the Italian and the French As the opening words of The Golden Ass' indicate, the plot was taken from a still extant Greek work, cius the Ass,' formerly, though probably incor rectly, attributed to Lucian, a contemporary. Apuleius, however, was no mere slavish trans lator. He improved the plot of the original by shortening several scenes and cleverly para phrasing others, by embellishing it with other excellent stories of love, sorcery, jests and rob bers, and in particular by inserting the long and beautiful allegory of Cupid and Psyche (bk. IV, sect. 28, to bk. VI, sect. 24), which has been described as °an antique gem in an unworthy Probably many of these stories were not original, but belonged to the common stock of Greek and Latin literature. There were quite a few collections of these the most famous of which was called Tales,' originally collected by one Aristides and translated into Latin in late republican times by the historian Sisenna. Probably some of these survived in the earlier novel of Petronius. Although most of the tales are of more than doubtful morality, Apuleius tells them in such a rollicking fashion that the spirit of fun pre dominates, just as in Boccaccio's which contain at least two of Apuleius' stories in Italian surroundings. The hero of The
Golden Ass,' one Lucius, traveled into Thes saly where, after a sojourn of a few days, he was transformed into an ass through his ex cessive curiosity to learn magic. Nothing could restore him to his own shape but the eat ing of a rose, which he at length obtained by prayer after many trials and adventures. The book ends with a fine description of the mys teries of Isis, into which the hero is initiated and through which he becomes purified. The theme of the work has been explained as some what allegorical: that men overcome by lusts of flesh become practically beasts and are not re stored to their pristine selves except by tasting the rose of reason and virtue to be obtained by prayer. Apuleius has been criticized for his rare and outlandish words, his coinages and jingling assonances, his gra-cisms and solecisms, but it must be admitted that the style which he has adopted is admirably suited to the character of the work. An eclectic critical text by S. Gaselee and a reprint of William Adlington's (1566) translation with improvements appear in the Loeb Classical Library (1915).