To navigate the timeline, click and drag it with your mouse, or click on the timeline overview on the bottom.
610 BCE
600 BCE
590 BCE
580 BCE
570 BCE
560 BCE
550 BCE
540 BCE
530 BCE
520 BCE
510 BCE
500 BCE
490 BCE
480 BCE
470 BCE
460 BCE
450 BCE
440 BCE
430 BCE
420 BCE
410 BCE
400 BCE
390 BCE
380 BCE
370 BCE
610 BCE - 546 BCE: Dates of Anaximander who develops the cosmic theory of the apeiron as the First Cause of existence.
585 BCE: Time in which Thales of Miletus lived.
571 BCE - 497 BCE: Life of Pythagoras of Samos; claim that "number" is the First Cause of existence and the soul is immortal.
570 BCE - 478 BCE: Life of Xenophanes of Colophon; claim of One God as the First Cause of existence.
546 BCE: Date of Anaximenes' work; air is claimed as the First Cause of existence.
500 BCE: Heraclitus of Ephesus lives; claims that change is the essence of life and First Cause.
500 BCE - 428 BCE: Life of Anaxagoras; claim that gods are irrelevant and all phenomena caused by natural forces.
485 BCE: Parmenides flourishes; claims universe is One and pluralism is an illusion.
485 BCE - 415 BCE: Life of the Sophist Protagoras of Abdera; claim that "man is the measure of all things".
484 BCE - 424 BCE: Life of Empedocles who claims that Strife and Love are the two constants in life.
465 BCE: Zeno of Elea flourishes; writes 40 logical paradoxes to support Parmenides' Monist view.
460 BCE - 403 BCE: Life of the tyrant and Sophist Critias; claim that gods do not exist and religion is the invention of the clever to control others.
460 BCE - 370 BCE: Life of Democritus, pupil of Leucippus; development of the concept of the atomic universe.
427 BCE: Sophist Gorgias flourishes; claim that knowledge is unknowable.