Aristotle

Aristotle was born around 384 BCE in the Macedonian city of Stagira; his father Nicomachus served as a physician to the Macedonian court, which likely influenced Aristotle’s early interest in biology and medicine. At about seventeen he went to Athens to join Plato’s Academy, where he studied and worked for roughly twenty years and acquired broad training in philosophy and the sciences. After leaving the Academy, Aristotle spent time in Asia Minor and on Lesbos, and subsequently became tutor to the young Alexander the Great while connected to the Macedonian court. During this period he conducted empirical investigations in biology and natural history and led philosophical circles in places such as Assos and Mytilene. In about 335 BCE Aristotle returned to Athens and established his own school, the Lyceum, where he taught, directed research, and composed much of the material that survives as his corpus. After Alexander’s death in 323 BCE, anti‑Macedonian sentiment in Athens led Aristotle to leave the city; he retreated to Chalcis on Euboea, where he died in 322 BCE, reportedly of natural causes.