Empedocles

Empedocles (; ; , 444–443 BC) was a Greek pre-Socratic philosopher and a native citizen of Akragas, a Greek city in Sicily. Empedocles' philosophy is known best for originating the cosmogonic theory of the four classical elements. He also proposed forces he called Love and Strife which would mix and separate the elements, respectively.

OverviewAI-generated

Empedocles was a male human born in Akragas around 490 BCE. He worked as a physician, philosopher, writer, and poet. His fields of work included philosophy and medicine. He wrote in Ancient Greek and was associated with the Pluralist school and Pre-Socratic philosophy. He studied under Anaxagoras, Parmenides, Heraclitus, and Pythagoras. His students included Gorgias, Corax of Syracuse, and Tisias.

He died in 430 BCE, though other dates such as 444 BCE and 432 BCE are also recorded. His death occurred at Mount Etna or in the Peloponnese due to falling. The manner of death is described as suicide. His native name is Ἐμπεδοκλῆς. His works appear in sources such as The Divine Comedy. He is described in the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary and the Encyclopædia Britannica 11th edition.

Synthesized by Vinony from 39 facts across 8 sources: Wikidata, Crossref, MusicBrainz, Last.fm, Wikiquote, Open Library, Europeana Sparql, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.

Person · Open Library

Born: 490 BCE
Died: 430 BCE
Works: 29

Top works

Carmina
[Kapharmoi
Empedocles
The Fragments of Empedocles
Empedocles Agrigentinus

via Open Library + Wikidata

Authority record · VIAF

Role / Field: Philosopher
Gender: Unknown

Recorded by 6 libraries

via VIAF · OCLC

Key facts

Philosopher.region: Western philosophy
Philosopher.era: Pre-Socratic philosophy
Philosopher.image: Empedokles.jpeg
Philosopher.caption: Empedocles of Agrigentum
Philosopher.name: Empedocles
Philosopher.birth_place: Akragas, Sicily
Philosopher.main_interests: Cosmogony, biology
Philosopher.notable_ideas: Classical four elements: fire, air, earth and water Love and Strife as opposing physical forces

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Instance of: human
Gender: male
Citizenship: Akragas
Place of birth: Akragas
Place of death: Peloponnese
Occupation: poet
Languages spoken: Ancient Greek
Student of: Pythagoras
Field of work: medicine
Movement: Pre-Socratic philosophy
Image: Empedocles. Line engraving, 1580. Wellcome V0001766.jpg

Show 15 more facts

date of birth: 0492-00-00
Commons category: Empedocles
manner of death: Suicide
date of death: 0434-00-00
student: Tisias
writing language: Ancient Greek
cause of death: falling
present in work: The Divine Comedy
influenced by: Pythagoras
name in native language: Ἐμπεδοκλῆς
P8168: Jinseong of Silla
maintained by WikiProject: WikiProject Mathematics
start of work period: 0477-00-00
end of work period: 0432-00-00
significant place: Akragas

Sources (9)

via Wikidata · CC0

Works in European collections

14 objects attributed to Empedocles, held across European museums, libraries & archives · via Europeana

Empedoclis et Parmenidis Fragmenta: simul agitur de genuino Graeco textu commentarii simplicii in Aristotelem de coelo et mundo

Empedocles Agrigentinus :De vita et philosophia eius

Empedoclis Agrigentini carminum reliquiae

The wisdom of the Empedocles according to their sources and their interpretation philosophically processed, together with a metric translation of the still existing places of his teaching poem about nature and the luminaries and his epigrams

Empedoclis Agrigentini Carminum Reliquiae : De Vita Ejus Et Studiis Disseruit ... Simon Karsten

Untitled

~14 min read

Encyclopedic overview

13 sections

Contents

Life
Death and legacy
Philosophy
Cosmogony
Psychology
Writings
Notes
References
Bibliography
Ancient Testimony
References
Further reading
External links

Empedocles challenged the practice of animal sacrifice and killing animals for food. He developed a distinctive doctrine of reincarnation. He is generally considered the last Greek philosopher to have recorded his ideas in verse. Some of his work survives, more than is the case for any other pre-Socratic philosopher. Empedocles' death was mythologized by ancient writers, and has been the subject of a number of literary treatments.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Empedocles” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

Empedocles