Fugitivi

ZEUS You mean the gymnosophists.[*](A generic name given by the Greeks to the holy men of India who lived naked. ) Anyhow, I am told, among other things about them, that they ascend a very lofty pyre and endure cremation without any change in their outward appearance or their sitting position.[*](Apparently a correction of Peregrinus, where (p. 30) the position is spoken of as “lying.” ) But that is nothing much. Just now, for example, at Olympia I saw the same sort of thing done, and very likely you too were there at the time when the old man was burned.

But to resume—after the Brahmans I went direct to Ethiopia, and then down to Egypt; and after associating with their priests and prophets and instructing them in religion, I departed for Babylon, to initiate Chaldeans and Magi; then from there to Scythia, and then to Thrace, where I conversed with Eumolpus and Orpheus, whom I sent in advance to Greece, one of them, Eumolpus, to give them the mysteries, as he had learned all about religion from me, and the other to win them over by the witchery of his music. Then I followed at once on their heels.

Just at first, on my arrival, the Greeks neither welcomed me very warmly nor shut the door in m face outright. But gradually, as I associated wit them, I attached to myself seven companions and pupils from among them all; then another from Samos, another from Ephesus, and one more from Abdera—only a few in all.[*](The seven were the Seven Sages, who as listed by Plato in the Protagoras (343 a) were Thales of Miletus, Pittacus of Mytilene, Bias of Priene, Solon of Athens, Cleobulus of Lindos, Myson of Chenae, and Chilon of Sparta; but Periander of Corinth was often included instead of Myson. The three whom Philosophy acquired later were Pythagoras of Samos,. Heraclitus of Ephesus, and Democritus of Abdera. )