Apuleius provides a nice little biography of Socrates with some enlightening references.
On Plato and His Doctrine, Book 1, chapter 3:
"But after Socrates left this earth, he sought where he might advance himself and so turned to the discipline of Pythagoras. Although he saw it as carefully and magnificently structured by reason, he desired more to imitate its restraint and chastity. And because he perceived that the intellect of the Pythagoreans was aided by other disciplines, he went to Theodorus of Cyrene1 to learn geometry and travelled as far as Egypt to study astrology and to learn the rites of the prophets there. He then returned to Italy and followed the Pythagoreans Eurytus of Tarentum2 and the elder Archytas3. He would have directed his mind to the Indians4 and the Magi5, had wars not prevented him at that time.
Therefore, having diligently pursued the dialectics of Parmenides6 and Zeno7, he filled his books with all the things that inspire admiration, so that he was the first to unite the tripartite philosophy8 and to show that its necessary parts not only do not conflict with each other but also mutually assist one another. For although these branches of philosophy were taken from different schools—natural philosophy from the Pythagoreans, rational philosophy from the Eleatics9, and moral philosophy from the very source of Socrates—he nevertheless made one body out of all of them, as if it were his own creation. And while the leaders of these schools had handed down to their students unpolished and incomplete ideas, he perfected them, both by refining them with reason and by clothing them in the most dignified form of eloquence, making them complete and even admirable".
Apuleius, De Platone et eius dogmate (Saec. II): LIBER I, caput 3:
«Sed posteaquam Socrates homines reliquit, quaesivit unde proficeret et ad Pythagorae disciplinam se contulit; quam etsi ratione diligenti et magnifica instructam videbat, rerum tamen continentiam et castitatem magiscupiebat imitari; et, quod Pythagoreorum ingenium adiutum disciplinis aliis sentiebat, ad Theodorum Cyrenas, ut geometriam disceret, est profectus et astrologiam adusque Aegyptum ivit petitum, ut inde prophetarum etiam ritus addisceret. Et ad Italiam iterum venit et Pythagoreos Eurytatum Tarentinumet seniorem Archytam sectatus est. Atque ad Indos et Magos intendisset animum, nisi tunc eum bella vetuissent. Dialectica quapropter inventia Parmenidae ac Zenonis studiosius exsecutus, ita omnibus quae admirationi sunt singula suos libros explevit, ut primus tripertitam philosophiam copularet, sibique invicem necessarias partes nec pugnare inter se tantummodo, sed etiam mutuis adiuvare auxiliis ostenderet. Nam quamvis de diversis officinis haec ei essent philosophiae membra suscepta, naturalis a Pythagoreis, de Eleaticis rationalis atque moralis ex ipso Socratis fonte, unum tamen ex omnibus et quasi proprii partus corpus effecit; et, cum principes harum familiarum inpolitas sententias et inchoatas auditoribus tradidissent, eas hic, cum ratione limando tum ad orationis augustae honestissimam speciem induendo, perfectas atque etiam admirabiles fecit».
1 Important ancient Greek mathematician from the 5th century BCE, known for his work on irrational numbers. He is mentioned in Plato’s Theaetetus, where he demonstrated that the square roots of non-square numbers up to 17 are irrational. His method of proof is not fully known, but it contributed to early Greek mathematical thought on incommensurable quantities.
2 Pythagorean philosopher, often associated with Philolaus. He is known for his unique approach to defining objects using numbers and pebbles, a method Aristotle described in his discussions on Pythagorean thought. Some sources suggest he was among the Tarentine Pythagoreans, though others place him in Croton.
3 Archytas of Tarentum, philosopher, mathematician, and statesman, closely associated with the Pythagorean school. He lived around 435–360 BCE and was a major figure in Magna Graecia (southern Italy).
4See the fragments from the Indica [Ἰνδικά] by Megasthenes, for an account of Ancient India from a Greek-speaking perspective.
5A magus [μάγος] was a Zoroastrian priest, from Persia, they were constantly associated with esoteric knowledge traditions.
6 Pre-Socratic Greek philosopher from Elea, Magna Graecia (modern-day southern Italy). He lived around the late 6th to early 5th century BCE and is considered the founder of the Eleatic school of philosophy.
7 Zeno of Elea, pre-Socratic Greek philosopher known for his paradoxes. He was a student of Parmenides and defended the idea that reality is one, unchanging, and indivisible.
8 This idea was championed by Plato who used these three terms in his works to refer to the parts of the sould:(Logos, λογιστικόν [logistikón], located around the head; thymos, θυμοειδές [thumoeidés], located around the chest area and finally eros ἐπιθυμητικόν [epithumetikón] which was located in the stomach.
9 School of pre-Socratic philosophers from Elea, a Greek colony in southern Italy. They flourished in the 5th century BCE and are known for their radical monism, arguing that reality is one, unchanging, and indivisible.
Gallery
Socrates in his younger years,
and in Assassin's Creed Odyssey
