Knowra Diogenes Laërtius Diogenes Laërtius Diogenes Laërtius was a Greek biographer whose Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers preserves anecdotes, doctrines, and writings attributed to ancient philosophers.
Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers : A ten-book compilation of biographies, doctrines, anecdotes, and testimonies about Greek philosophers. This is the work through which Diogenes Laërtius is known.
Presocratic philosophy : Early Greek philosophical inquiry before Socrates, concerned especially with nature, change, and the cosmos. His reports preserve biographical and doctrinal material about early thinkers.
Hellenistic period : The era of Greek history from Alexander the Great's death in 323 BCE to the Roman conquest of Egypt in 30 BCE. The biographical and doxographical traditions Diogenes gathered developed substantially in this era.
Plato : An Athenian philosopher whose dialogues shaped Western philosophy and portray Socrates as their central speaker. Plato's authored dialogues offer a distinct kind of evidence from Diogenes' compiled reports.
Transmission of ancient texts : The copying, editing, and preservation of written works from antiquity through later manuscript traditions. The surviving text's manuscript history affects how its reports and quotations can be read.
Doxography : The recording and organization of the doctrines attributed to earlier thinkers. His biographies preserve philosophical teachings alongside accounts of lives.
Pythagoras : An ancient Greek thinker associated with a movement linking mathematics, cosmology, and religious practice. Diogenes records traditions about Pythagoras and the community associated with him.
Pamphilus of Alexandria : An ancient Greek scholar whose lost Miscellaneous Notes was cited by later writers. Diogenes names Pamphilus as one source for material in his compilation.
Aristotle : A Greek philosopher whose surviving treatises address logic, nature, ethics, politics, and other subjects. Aristotle's own works provide direct philosophical arguments unlike Diogenes' biographical compilations.
Source criticism : The evaluation of a text's sources, their reliability, and the transformations they undergo. Diogenes often combines authorities without making every source relationship transparent.
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