ABSTRACT
Iamblichus 1. (C2 ad) A novelist, the author of The Babylonian Tale or The Tale of Sinonis and Rhodanes, short fragments of which have survived; a summary written by the ninth-century Byzantine scholar Photius is preserved in his Bibliotheke (‘Library’). According to a marginal note in the summary, Iamblichus was a Syrian who had learnt the Babylonian language from a prisoner of that nationality who was captured in Trajan’s time, though this may be a fiction designed to lend credibility to his story. He also claimed to have undertaken the learning of Greek in which he wrote his novel. It was a highly erotic and sensational fiction, and Photius comments on its skilful use of language and attractive characters. The material and its treatment are typical of ancient novels. See B.P. Reardon (ed.) (c.1989) Collected Ancient Greek Novels, Berkeley, CA; London: University of California Press.
