Theophrastus, a Greek native of Eressos in Lesbos, was the successor of Aristotle in the Peripatetic school. He came to Athens at a young age, and initially studied in Plato's school. After Plato's death he attached himself to Aristotle. Ar...

Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher as well as the founder of the school of philosophy called Epicureanism. Only a few fragments and letters of Epicurus's 300 written works remain. Much of what is known about Epicurean philosophy deri...

Chrysippus of Soli was a Greek Stoic philosopher. He was a pupil of Cleanthes, and his successor, in 230 BC, as third head of the Stoic school. A prolific writer, Chrysippus expanded the fundamental doctrines of Zeno of Citium, the founder...

Posidonius of Apameia or of Rhodes was a Greek Stoic philosopher, politician, astronomer, geographer, historian and teacher native to Apamea, Syria. He was acclaimed as the greatest polymath of his age. None of his vast body of work can be...

Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman philosopher, politician, lawyer, orator, political theorist, consul and constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome's great...

Strabo was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher. Strabo is mostly famous for his 17-volume work Geographica, which presented a descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known to his era. Although...

Philo, known also as Philo of Alexandria, Philo Judaeus, Philo Judaeus of Alexandria, Yedidia and Philo the Jew, was an Hellenistic Jewish philosopher born in Alexandria. Philo used allegory to fuse and harmonize Greek philosophy and Judais...

Lucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero. While he was later forced to commit suicide for alle...

Marcus Antoninus the Philosopher, Roman Emperor from 161 to his death in 180. It is this quality of Marcus' character which has made him a unique figure in Roman history, since he was the only emperor whose life was molded by, and devoted t...

Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus, better known as Galen of Pergamum (modern-day Bergama, Turkey), was a prominent Roman physician and philosopher of Greek origin, and probably the most accomplished medical researcher of the Roman period....

Diogenes Laërtius was a biographer of the Greek philosophers. Nothing is definitively known about his life, but his surviving Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers is a principal source for the history of ancient Greek philosophy....

Plotinus was a major philosopher in the ancient world and is widely considered the father of Neoplatonism. Much of our biographical information about him comes from Porphyry's preface to his edition of Plotinus' Enneads. His metaphysical wr...

Augustine of Hippo was an early Christian theologian and philosopher from Numidia whose writings influenced the development of Western Christianity and Western philosophy. He was the bishop of Hippo Regius in north Africa and is viewed as o...

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boëthius, commonly called Boethius, was a Roman senator, consul, magister officiorum, and philosopher of the early 6th century. He was born about a year after Odoacer deposed the last Western Roman Emperor and decl...

Al-Farabi was a renowned scientist and philosopher of the Islamic Golden Age. He was also a cosmologist, logician, and musician. Through his commentaries and treatises, Al-Farabi became well known among medieval Muslim intellectuals as "...