Lucian of Samosata (c.AD 125 - after AD 180) was a rhetorician and satirist who wrote in the Greek language. He is noted for his witty and scoffing nature. Although he wrote solely in Greek, mainly Attic Greek, he was ethnically Assyrian. Few details of Lucian's life can be verified with any degree of accuracy. He claimed to have been born in Samosata, in the former kingdom of Commagene. In his works, he refers to himself as an "Assyrian", and "barbarian". The first printed edition of a selection of his works was issued at Florence in 1499.

His best known works are A True Story (a romance, patently not "true" at all, which he admits in his introduction to the story), Dialogues of the Gods and Dialogues of the Dead. There are 70 surviving works attributed to Lucian He wrote in a variety of styles which included comic dialogues, rhetorical essays and prose fiction.