page_title: The Golden Ass
section_title: Book Nine
hierarchical_section_title: The Golden Ass / Plot / Book Nine
caption_attribution_description: English: Illustration to a French version of The Golden Ass. Here Lucius is returned to human form at the procession of Isis.
context_page_description: The Metamorphoses of Apuleius, which Augustine of Hippo referred to as The Golden Ass, is the only ancient Roman novel in Latin to survive in its entirety.
  The protagonist of the novel is called Lucius. At the end of the novel, he is revealed to be from Madaurus, the hometown of Apuleius himself. The plot revolves around the protagonist's curiosity and insatiable desire to see and practice magic. While trying to perform a spell to transform into a bird, he is accidentally transformed into an ass. This leads to a long journey, literal and metaphorical, filled with inset tales. He finally finds salvation through the intervention of the goddess Isis, whose cult he joins.
context_section_description: Lucius' untimely escape from the cook coincides with an attack by rabid dogs, and his wild behavior is attributed to their viral bites. The men barricade him in a room until it is decided that he is no longer infected. The band of Galli eventually pack up and leave.
  The narrative is interrupted by The Tale of the Wife's Tub.
  Soon after, the Galli are accosted by an armed troop who accuse them of stealing from their village temple, and are subsequently detained (with the treasures returned). Lucius is sold into labor, driving a baker's mill-wheel. Lucius, though bemoaning his labor as an ass, also realizes that this state has allowed him to hear many novel things with his long ass-ears.
  The Tale of the Jealous Husband and The Tale of the Fuller's Wife mark a break in the narrative. The theme of the two intervening stories is adultery, and the text appropriately follows with the adultery of the baker's wife and the subsequent murder of the baker.
  Lucius the ass is then auctioned off to a farmer. The Tale of the Oppressive Landlord is here told. The farmer duly assaults a legionary who makes advances on his ass, Lucius, but he is found out and jailed.
caption: Lucius is returned to human form during the Navigium Isidis. From an Illustration by Jean de Bosschère
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