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Xenophanes

Type Figure Region Ionia Time c. -570–-478 Also known as Xenophanes of Colophon、Xenophanes

Xenophanes was a Greek philosopher and poet born at Colophon in the 6th century BCE, active in Ionia and southern Italy;…

Timeline

  1. c. -570–-540Colophon · ColophonXenophanes was born in the Ionian polis of Colophon and went into exile because of the Persian invasion, wandering Greece as a wandering poet; during this time he began criticizing in verse and prose the images of the gods depicted by Homer and Hesiod, opening the way for philosophical theological reflection.
  2. c. -540–-478Southern Italy · Magna GraeciaContinuing to teach and write in southern Italy and elsewhere, Xenophanes proposed a single, formless and all-knowing god as the principle of the world, and used fossil evidence to question the traditional notion that the world is eternally unchanging; his rationalized theology was a forerunner for Parmenides and the later tradition of philosophical theology.

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