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Pre-Socratic Wonder
Heraclitus
Ἡράκλειτος · c. 535 – c. 475 BCE
An aristocrat of Ephesus known for terse, riddling sayings that survive only as fragments quoted by later writers. He saw the world as ceaseless change held together by an underlying order he called the logos, and was nicknamed "the Obscure" in antiquity.
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Pre-Socratic Wonder
Parmenides
Παρμενίδης · c. 515 – after 450 BCE
Founder of the Eleatic tradition, Parmenides wrote a philosophical poem in which a goddess reveals two paths: the way of truth and the way of mortal opinion. His argument that what is cannot come from what is not shaped all later Greek metaphysics.
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Pythagorean
Pythagoras
Πυθαγόρας · c. 570 – c. 495 BCE
Pythagoras founded a community at Croton devoted to mathematics, music and a disciplined way of life. He wrote nothing that survives, and much attributed to him comes from later followers, so his own views are hard to separate from the tradition named after him.
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Socratic
Socrates
Σωκράτης · c. 470 – 399 BCE
An Athenian stonemason's son who wrote nothing, Socrates spent his life questioning fellow citizens about justice, courage and the good life. Known mainly through Plato and Xenophon, he was tried and executed in 399 BCE for impiety and corrupting the youth.
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Platonic (The Academy)
Plato
Πλάτων · c. 428 – 348 BCE
Socrates' most famous student, Plato wrote dialogues that remain foundational to Western philosophy and founded the Academy in Athens. His work ranges across ethics, politics, knowledge, love and the nature of reality.
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Aristotelian (The Lyceum)
Aristotle
Ἀριστοτέλης · 384 – 322 BCE
Aristotle studied at Plato's Academy for twenty years, tutored the young Alexander, and founded the Lyceum. His Nicomachean Ethics argues that eudaimonia is an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue over a complete life.
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Cynic
Diogenes of Sinope
Διογένης · c. 412 – 323 BCE
Exiled from Sinope, Diogenes lived in Athens in deliberate poverty, reportedly sleeping in a large storage jar. Known through anecdotes collected centuries later, he used provocative acts and sharp wit to expose the emptiness of convention.
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Epicurean (The Garden)
Epicurus
Ἐπίκουρος · 341 – 270 BCE
Epicurus founded a school in a garden outside Athens that welcomed women and slaves. Most of his writing is lost, but letters and maxims survive through Diogenes Laertius. He taught that tranquillity comes from simple pleasures, friendship and freedom from fear.
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Stoic
Zeno of Citium
Ζήνων ὁ Κιτιεύς · c. 334 – c. 262 BCE
A merchant from Cyprus who, after a shipwreck, came to Athens and studied with the Cynic Crates. He founded Stoicism, teaching at the Painted Porch (Stoa Poikile). His own writings are lost and known through later reports.
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Stoic
Epictetus
Ἐπίκτητος · c. 50 – c. 135 CE
Born enslaved, Epictetus studied Stoicism in Rome, gained his freedom and later taught in Nicopolis, Greece. His student Arrian recorded his lectures as the Discourses and condensed them into the Enchiridion, or Handbook.
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Cyrenaic
Aristippus of Cyrene
Ἀρίστιππος · c. 435 – c. 356 BCE
A companion of Socrates who, according to Diogenes Laertius, was the first Socratic to charge fees. Ancient anecdotes portray him as at ease in luxury and hardship alike. The systematic Cyrenaic doctrine may owe much to his grandson, Aristippus the Younger, so attributing particular teachings to him is uncertain.
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Cynic
Hipparchia of Maroneia
Ἱππαρχία · fl. c. 325 BCE
One of the few women philosophers of antiquity whose life is recorded. She married the Cynic Crates against her family’s wishes and shared his life of public philosophy. Later sources say she wrote works, now lost, so almost nothing of her own thought survives; the one saying kept here is drawn from brief anecdotes in Diogenes Laertius, written centuries later.
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Pyrrhonian Sceptic
Sextus Empiricus
Σέξτος Ἐμπειρικός · fl. c. 200 CE
A doctor and Pyrrhonian Sceptic whose Outlines of Pyrrhonism is our fullest ancient account of scepticism. Little is known of his life. He presents scepticism not as a theory but as an ability and a way of living: setting arguments against each other and suspending judgment.
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Stoic
Marcus Aurelius
Μάρκος Αὐρήλιος · 121 – 180 CE
Roman emperor from 161 to 180 CE, who wrote private notes to himself in Greek, now called the Meditations. They were not written for publication and record a ruler’s effort to apply Stoic teachings amid war, plague and the demands of office.
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Platonic (The Academy)
Diotima of Mantinea
Διοτίμα · 5th c. BCE (as portrayed)
A priestess and teacher whom Socrates, in Plato’s Symposium, credits with teaching him about love. She is known only through that dialogue, and scholars debate whether she was a real person or Plato’s invention; her teachings here are those Plato gives her.
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