Thelyphron is a man who tells a story at a feast hosted by Byrrhena while Lucius is in attendance, too. He agrees to guard a corpse overnight for a widow, to protect its face from being defiled by witches. At first he appears to be successful, but as it turns out, the witches have mixed him up with the dead man and stolen his own ears and nose, replacing them with wax. Thelyphron is another character who foreshadows the role magic will play in Lucius’s story, and his strange misfortune shows how humans are subject to the whims of Fate.
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Thelyphron Character Timeline in The Golden Ass
The timeline below shows where the character Thelyphron appears in The Golden Ass. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Book 2
...magic is lurking somewhere in the city. Some of the guests invite a man called Thelyphron to tell a story. He reclines on a couch and begins.
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In Thelyphron’s story, he is traveling from Miletus to see the Olympic games. He’s also on the...
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...to make up the difference by having a portion of his own face cut off. Thelyphron agrees to be the watchman and asks about the price, which turns out to be...
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The old man leads Thelyphron to the house of a weeping widow who needs someone to guard her husband’s corpse....
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Thelyphron’s guard duty is easy at the beginning. A weasel comes in, and he shoos it...
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Thelyphron gets the sudden urge to refuse the money and says the widow should simply consider...
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The dead man explains that while Thelyphron was guarding his body, a witch cast a spell of drowsiness on Thelyphron. Then the...
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The crowd laughs at Thelyphron. He leaves and journeys for a long time, letting his hair grow long to hide...
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