Philostratus the Athenian

c. 170 CE–c. 245 CE · Athens

'Philostratus the Athenian' refers to the most famous of several closely related Greek writers named Philostratus active in the late 2nd and early 3rd centuries CE, the author usually credited with the Life of Apollonius of Tyana and the Lives of the Sophists. Because several relatives bore the same name and worked in similar genres, ancient and modern scholars have struggled to assign individual works with certainty.

See Philostratus the Athenian’s journey on the map →

Life journeyclick any stop, or use ←/→

Stop 1 of 1

AthensAttica (Greece)

We know they were here, but the specifics of what they did at this stop aren’t recorded yet in our corpus.

About Athens

The intellectual capital of the Greek world, where Socrates questioned in the agora and four great schools—Plato's Academy, Aristotle's Lyceum, the Stoa, and Epicurus' Garden—took root within a single square mile.

In Athens at the same time

Alcinous, Lucian of Samosata, Julius Pollux, Alexander of Aphrodisias, Philostratus Sophista, Dexippus

Across the traditions, in Athens at the same time

See other sages who lived in Athens→

In the same place & time

Sages whose lives overlapped with Philostratus the Athenian’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.

Across the traditions

In the same tradition

Alcinous, Lucian of Samosata, Julius Pollux, Alexander of Aphrodisias, Philostratus Sophista, Dexippus, Porphyrius

The world in their lifetime

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