Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism
Pythagoras was an Ionian Greek born on the island of Samos, probably about 570 BCE. His dislike of the policies of the Samian tyrant Polycrates caused him to immigrate to Crotona in southern Italy. There he founded a society with religious and political, as well as philosophical, aims that gained power in the city and considerably extended its influence over the surrounding area. A certain Cylon, however, stirred up a revolt against the society in which a number of its leading members were killed, and Pythagoras retired to Metapontum. The community recovered its influence until a more serious persecution took place in the middle of the fifth century, from which the survivors scattered to various parts of the Greek world—notably Thebes, Phleius, and Tarentum. In these places "they preserved their original ways and their science, although the sect was dwindling, until, not ignobly, they died out" (in the late fourth century), to quote the epitaph written by a contemporary.
Nature of the Evidence
The obstacles to an appraisal of classical Pythagoreanism are formidable. There exists no Pythagorean literature before Plato, and it was said that little had been written, owing to a rule of secrecy. Information from the Christian era is abundant but highly suspect.
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