Academy

in ancient Greece, the academy, or college, of philosophy in the northwestern outskirts of Athens, where Plato acquired property about 387 &BC; and used to teach. At the site there had been an olive grove, park, and gymnasium sacred to the legendary Attic hero Academus (or Hecademus).

The designation academy, as a school of philosophy, is usually applied not to Plato's immediate circle but to his successors down to the Roman Cicero's time (106–43 &BC;). Legally, the school was a corporate body organized for worship of the Muses, the scholarch (or headmaster) being elected for life by a majority vote of the members.

Most scholars infer, mainly from Plato's writings, that instruction originally included mathematics, dialectics, natural science, and preparation for statesmanship. The Academy continued until &AD; 529, when the emperor Justinian closed it, together with the other pagan schools.

The Academy philosophically underwent various phases, arbitrarily classified as follows: (1) the Old Academy, under Plato and his immediate successors as scholarchs, when the philosophic thought there was moral, speculative, and dogmatic, (2) the Middle Academy, begun by Arcesilaus (316/315–c. 241 &BC;), who introduced a nondogmatic skepticism, and (3) the New Academy, founded by Carneades (2nd century &BC;), which ended with the scholarch Antiochus of Ascalon (d. 68 &BC;), who effected a return to the dogmatism of the Old Academy. Thereafter, the Academy was a centre of Middle Platonism and Neoplatonism until it was closed in the 6th century &AD;.