Definition:

Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), one of the greatest and most versatile philosophers of all time, was born in the city of Stagira in Macedonia. His father, Nichomacus, was King Amyntas of Macedonia's personal physician.

In 367, at the age of 17, Aristotle went to Athens to attend the Academy, a school, which had been founded by Plato and named for the grove in which it was located. Aristotle stayed at the Academy (where he taught rhetoric), until the founder's death in 347, at which time the Academy was handed over to Plato's nephew Speusippus.


Then Aristotle left Athens, traveling until 343 when he became tutor at the Macedonian court for Alexander, soon to be known as the Great. Aristotle lived at the court for eight years, and then returned to Athens where he taught in a gymnasium named the Lyceum. Aristole walked around talking with his students, and for this practice, his school is referred to as Peripatetic. His fields of study included logic, grammar, rhetoric, literary criticism, natural history, physiology, psychology, and the history of philosophy. Aristotle's successor at the Lyceum was Theophrastus.

Charged with impiety after the death of Alexander, Aristotle retired to Colchis where he died.

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