True History or True Story is a tale by Lucian of Samosata about a group of adventurers who, while sailing through the Pillars of Hercules (the Strait of Gibraltar), are lifted up by a giant waterspout and deposited on the Moon. There they find themselves embroiled in a full-scale interplanetary war between the king of the Moon and the king of the Sun over colonization rights to Jupiter, involving armies which boast such exotica as stalk-and-mushroom men, acorn-dogs, and cloud-centaurs. He portrays the Moon and planets as being genuine worlds with unique life-forms of their own. In fact, although some see True History as a forerunner to modern fantasy and science fiction, Lucian intended it to be a form of literary criticism. As noted by classicist B.P. Reardon, "above all, it is a parody of literary "liars" like Homer and Herodotus." (Collected Ancient Greek Novels, B.P. Readrdon, ed., page 619).

Lucian intended True History to mock the efforts of previous writers who wrote of fantastic journeys. He mentions the tales of Ctesias, Iambulus, and Homer and states that "what did surprise me was their supposition that nobody would notice they were lying." Lucian goes on to state that the story recounted in True History is about "things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." (Ibid., page 622). Although Lucian intended the tale in True History to be entertaining, and many readers have enjoyed it as such, his ultimate goal was to parody the outlandish tales of his time.

External links

• A.M. Harmon, Introduction to Lucian of Samosata
• Loeb Classical Library, vol. 3/8 of Lucian's works, with facing Greek text
• Works of Lucian of Samostata at sacred-texts.com