CHARITON

flourished 2nd century AD, , Aphrodisias, Caria, Asia Minor Greek novelist, author of Chaereas and Callirho, the earliest fully extant romantic novel in Western literature. The complex but clearly narrated plot concerns a husband and wife whose love is tested by a series of fast-moving, perilous adventures in Sicily, Persia, and Egypt, ending in eventual happiness. Historical persons are introduced as characters but are treated with free invention.