EBOOK Pythagoras and the Early Pythagoreans

Pythagoras (c. 570 - c. 495 BC), arguably the most influential thinker among the        Presocratics, emerges in ancient tradition as a wise teacher, an outstanding        mathematician, an influential politician, and as a religious and ethical reformer.          He claimed to possess supernatural powers and was the kind of personality who        attracted legends. In contrast to his controversial and elusive nature, the early        Pythagoreans, such as the doctors Democedes and Alcmaeon, the Olympic victors        Milonand Iccus, the botanist Menestor, the natural philosopher Hippon, and the        mathematicians Hippasus and Theodorus, all appear in our sources as 'rational' as        they can possibly be. It was this 'normality' that ensured the continued existence        of Pythagoreanism as a philosophical and scientific school tillc. 350 BC.This volume        offers a comprehensive study of Pythagoras and the early Pythagoreans through an        analysis of the many representations of the Teacher and his followers, allowing the        representations to complement and critique each other. Relying predominantly on        sources dating back to before 300 BC, Zhmud portrays a more historical picture of        Pythagoras, of the society founded by him, and of its religion than is known from        the late antique biographies. In chapters devoted to mathematical and        naturalsciences cultivated by the Pythagoreans and to their philosophies, a critical        distinction is made between the theories of individual figures and a generalized        'all-Pythagorean teaching', which is known from Aristotle.