4th century BC
Plato builds a system. Aristotle teaches a conqueror
What happened — and why
Plato's Academy and Aristotle's Lyceum
Plato founds the first university. Aristotle — his finest pupil — opens his own school and systematizes all knowledge. He named the school the Lyceum — and from that word came the "lycée": the one at Tsarskoye Selo, the French lycée, every lycée in the world.
The philosophical cause
The execution of Socrates posed a question: how do you build a society where wisdom is not killed? Plato answers: "Philosophers must rule."
Plato is nearly sold into slavery for his ideas. Aristotle flees Athens — "so as not to let the Athenians sin against philosophy twice."
Alexander the Great
A pupil of Aristotle conquers half the world — from Greece to India. He carries Greek culture and language with him.
The philosophical cause
Aristotle — Aristotle taught him for three years: logic, politics, ethics. Alexander carried the manuscripts of Homer and the Iliad with him.
Greek becomes the language of world culture — the language in which the New Testament will later be written.
