Stoicism facts for kids

Zeno of Citium, the founder of Stoicism, in the Farnese collection, Naples – Photo by Paolo Monti, 1969.

Stoicism was a school of Hellenistic philosophy and was founded in Athens by Zeno of Citium in the early third century BC. It concerns the active relationship between cosmic determinism and human freedom, and the belief that it is virtuous to maintain a will (called prohairesis) that is in accord with nature.

Stoic doctrine was popular in Greece and the Roman Empire from its founding until all the schools of philosophy were ordered closed in 529 AD by the Emperor Justinian I, who perceived their pagan character to be at odds with his Christian faith.

Stoic philosophers

• Antipater of Tarsus (210 BC–129 BC)
• Cato the Younger (Uticensis 94 BC–46 BC)
• Chrysippus (280 BC–204 BC)
• Cleanthes (of Assos), (330 BC–232 BC)
• Diodotus, (~120 BC–59 BC), teacher of Cicero
• Diogenes of Babylon (230 BC–150 BC)
• Epictetus (55 AD–135 AD)
• Hierocles (2nd century AD)
• Marcus Aurelius (121 AD–180 AD)
• Panaetius of Rhodes (185 BC–109 BC)
• Posidonius of Apameia (~135 BC–51 BC)
• Seneca (4 BC–65 AD)
  • Contemporaries: Musonius Rufus, Rubellius Plautus, Thrasea Paetus
• Zeno of Citium (332 BC–262 BC), founder of Stoicism
  • Contemporaries: Aristo of Chios, pupil of Zeno; Herillus of Carthage

Images for kids

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  Zeno of Citium, cast in Pushkin Museum in Moscow from original in Naples

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  Antisthenes, founder of the Cynic school of philosophy

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  Marcus Aurelius, the Stoic emperor

See also

In Spanish: Estoicismo para niños