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Philip of Opus

Philip of Opus

c. 385 BCE · Athens

Philip of Opus was a Greek philosopher and astronomer of the fourth century BCE, a pupil and associate of Plato. By ancient tradition he edited Plato's last and unfinished work, the "Laws," preparing it for publication after his master's death, and he is widely thought to be the author of the appendix to it known as the "Epinomis." He also had interests in mathematics and astronomy, though little of his own work survives.

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AthensAttica (Greece)

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About Athens

Athens, the capital of Greece since 1834, was the leading intellectual centre of the classical Greek world. Socrates taught there, and four major philosophical schools took root in the city: Plato's Academy, founded around 387 BCE, Aristotle's Lyceum, the Stoa of Zeno, and Epicurus' Garden. Under Hellenistic and Roman rule Athens remained a place of study that drew students from across the empire; in the 4th century CE the Christian writers Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus studied there together, while Neoplatonist teachers kept lecturing. Emperor Justinian's ban on pagan teaching of philosophy in 529 is generally taken to mark the end of the city's ancient history.

In Athens at the same time

Gorgias of Leontini, Democritus, Antisthenes, Lysias, Isocrates, Alcidamas

Across the traditions, in Athens at the same time

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In the same place & time

Sages whose lives overlapped with Philip of Opus’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with Philip of Opus’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works(1)