Menippus was born in Corinth, the wealthy city that stood on the narrow isthmus connecting the Peloponnese to mainland Greece, a port of legendary luxury where merchants from every corner of the Mediterranean came to trade. He was a young man of good family, twenty-five years old, tall and athletic, with the kind of beauty that made him conspicuous in a city already famous for its handsome citizens. He had devoted himself to the study of philosophy, following the lectures of the local teachers and dreaming of a life of wisdom and contemplation. Corinth was a city of pleasure as well as learning, and Menippus moved between the lecture halls and the gymnasium with the ease of a young man who had never known serious hardship.

He met his bride on the road to Lechaeum, the western port of Corinth that looked out across the Gulf of Corinth toward the mountains of Aetolia. She was standing beside the road, or walking upon it, and she was the most beautiful woman Menippus had ever seen. She told him that she was a Phoenician, the daughter of a wealthy merchant who had settled in Corinth with a fortune in gold and slaves. She was wealthy beyond measure, she said, and she lived in a villa outside the city gates, but she was lonely, for her parents were dead and she had no family in Greece. She spoke with the eloquence of a well-educated woman, and her conversation ranged from poetry to philosophy with an ease that matched Menippus's own interests. He fell in love with her, and she encouraged his courtship with gifts and invitations to her villa.

The courtship lasted for months, and Menippus grew more devoted with every meeting. The woman, who never gave her true name, was everything he had ever wanted: beautiful, intelligent, wealthy, and passionately in love with him. She asked him to marry her, and he agreed with the joy of a young man who believes that the gods have finally granted his prayers. He prepared a wedding feast and invited his friends, including Apollonius of Tyana, the famous philosopher and wonder-worker who had recently arrived in Corinth. Apollonius accepted the invitation, though he watched the bride with eyes that seemed to look through her rather than at her.

The wedding was held in a hall near the woman's villa, outside the city gates. The guests gathered, the wine was poured, and the music began. But Apollonius did not celebrate. He sat in silence, studying the bride, and when the moment came for the wedding vows, he stood up and addressed the company. He told Menippus that his bride was not a woman at all but a lamia, a creature of the night that fed on the flesh and blood of young men. The guests laughed, but Apollonius was not deterred. He turned to the bride and commanded her to reveal her true form. The woman denied it, weeping with indignation, but Apollonius persisted, describing the creature she was: a lamia, a type of empousa, a phantom that took the shape of a beautiful woman to lure young men to their destruction.

Under the philosopher's relentless questioning, the creature broke. She admitted that she was indeed a lamia, a spirit who had fallen in love with Menippus's beauty and his philosophical nature, and who had planned to consummate her love by devouring him after the wedding, as she had already devoured the two young men who had preceded him as her lovers. She had kept their bodies in her villa, she said, and she had used her magic to create the illusion of wealth and beauty that had captivated Menippus. The wedding feast was a trap, the bridal chamber a slaughterhouse, and the wine in Menippus's cup would have been the last thing he tasted before she tore out his throat. As she confessed, her beautiful form melted away, revealing a creature of indescribable horror, with blazing eyes, fangs, and a body that was neither fully human nor fully beast. She howled and vanished, or in some accounts she dissolved into smoke, and the wedding hall was left empty of everything but the stench of death and the weeping of the groom.

Menippus survived, but he was never the same. The story spread through Corinth and across the Greek world, and it became one of the most famous episodes in the life of Apollonius of Tyana, the proof that the philosopher's wisdom was not merely theoretical but could pierce the disguises of the supernatural and save lives. For Menippus, the lesson was more personal. He had learned that beauty can be a mask, that wealth can be an illusion, and that the most dangerous predator is the one who comes to you in the shape of love. Some accounts say that he abandoned philosophy and became a wanderer himself, unable to trust any face he saw. Others say that he became a devoted follower of Apollonius, travelling with him as a disciple. The truth is lost, but the story remains: the young man who almost married a monster, and the philosopher who saved him by looking past the surface to the horror beneath.