Chief characters:
Clitophon, a Greek of Tyre, son of Hippias Leucippe, daughter of Sostratus of Byzantium, the uncle of Clitophon Clinias of Sidon, cousin of Clitophon Chaereas of Pharos, a fisherman Melitte, a woman of Ephesus Thersander, the husband of Melitte Callisthenes of Byzantium Calligone, the half-sister of Clitophon
Minor characters:
Sostratus, of Byzantium, father of Leucippe Panthea, his wife Hippias, a Tyrian, father of Clitophon and Calligone Charicles, the amicus of Clinias Menelaus, an Egyptian Sosthenes, the bailiff of Thersander Satyrus, a slave of Clitophon Clio, Leucippe’s chambermaid, in love with Satyrus Charmides, an Egyptian general Gorgias, an Egyptian soldier
For the plot I condense Phillimore’s well-written summary.[142] The author begins with a description of Sidon. He has reached Sidon in his travels and is touring the city, looking at the temples. He describes a painting of Zeus and Europa, also a statue of Eros. He was reflecting on the Eros: “Think of such a brat being lord of earth and sea!” When a young man near testifies to Eros’ power which he has felt, the author invites him to tell his story. In a Platonic scene under a plane-tree near a stream they sit down.
The stranger, Clitophon, a Greek of Tyre, tells his story in the first person. Clitophon has been unwillingly betrothed at nineteen to his half-sister, Calligone. Now his uncle, Sostratus, writes that he is sending his daughter Leucippe and her mother from their home in Byzantium to Tyre for safety during a war. Clitophon at once falls in love with Leucippe. He makes his cousin, Clinias, his confidant. Clinias is sympathetic because he had a tragic love affair with a youth who was killed by a fall from a horse which Clinias gave him. (Here is introduced a purple patch on the driving accident.)
Encouraged by Clinias, Clitophon makes love constantly. Various scenes of his wooing, for example a garden, are described in detail. Finally the lovers elope, find a ship at Berytus, embark and start to Alexandria. They meet an Egyptian fellow-passenger, Menelaus. There comes a great storm. Hero and heroine are cast on shore at Pelusium near the temple of Zeus Casius. Enter black brigands. Soldiers rescue Clitophon, but Leucippe is kidnapped. Clitophon joins in an attempt to save her, but it is baulked by a deep, impassable canal between the rescuing party and the ten thousand brigands. Across it Clitophon watches the bandits perform a human sacrifice by disembowelling the victim before an altar. It is Leucippe. The body is put in a coffin.
The next day the canal is diked and crossed. Clitophon resolves to die on Leucippe’s body, but suddenly he meets his slave Satyrus and Menelaus, both saved from the wreck, who assure him that Leucippe is alive. On the coffin being opened, she comes out—“Gashed open and minus all viscera.” But the murderers had been deceived by a sheepskin full of animal entrails attached to her and by a stage sword which never penetrated her body. Clinias too was saved from the wreck. Now a punitive expedition under Charmides, the Egyptian, starts, but unfortunately he falls in love with Leucippe and has a philtre given her which drives her insane. On her recovery they go to Alexandria. There a new rival, Chaereas, abducts Leucippe. Clitophon pursues on a ship of war, but has to endure seeing Leucippe beheaded on the deck of the enemy’s vessel. Clitophon recovers the head from the sea and gives it burial.
Six months later Clitophon meets Clinias again. Clinias who had been home in Sidon reports that “the cruel parent had actually betrothed the loving cousins” so Clitophon and Leucippe might have married in peace. Clitophon who naturally believes Leucippe dead is pursued by Melitte, a lovely, wealthy and amorous widow of Ephesus. He finally yields to her; they are betrothed in the temple of Isis and are to be married when they reach Ephesus. On their arrival, Melitte drives Clitophon around her great estates. There he has the overwhelming surprise of encountering Leucippe who is working in the garden as a miserable slave. This difficult situation is made more complicated by the sudden reappearance of Melitte’s husband, Thersander, who had been falsely reported drowned at sea. Thersander beats up Clitophon as an adulterer with his wife and has him imprisoned.
Sosthenes, the bailiff of Thersander, interests his master in Leucippe, so he tries to seduce her, but unsuccessfully. Clitophon in prison is told a false story that both Leucippe and Melitte are faithless to him. Clitophon resolves to denounce Melitte as an accomplice in a plot for the murder of Leucippe and then to die. He is tried for adultery and self-confessed murder, but Clinias foils his attempt by telling the whole truth in court. Sosthenes departs, leaving Leucippe free. Leucippe’s father, Sostratus, by good fortune arrives in Ephesus on a sacred embassy just in time to assist his daughter. The trial of Clitophon is resumed in a long court scene in which finally Thersander challenges Leucippe and Melitte to tests of chastity by the magic pipes of Pan and the magic spring of Rhodopis. Both pass the ordeals. Thersander, since everything is going against him, for his slave, Sosthenes, has been captured and will be forced to confess the truth, flees. Sosthenes confesses. Clitophon is acquitted. Leucippe tells her whole story: how the bandits beheaded another woman dressed in her clothes to prevent Clitophon from following; how a quarrel over her arose among them in which Chaereas was slain; then she was sold by the other pirates to Sosthenes, who bought her for Thersander. Sostratus then relates the secondary romance of Callisthenes and Calligone. The novel ends with a happy reunion of all at Tyre where prayers and sacrifices are offered in behalf of the lasting felicity of Clitophon and Leucippe, of Callisthenes and Calligone.