Vitae philosophorum

There are some who say that the study of philosophy had its beginning among the barbarians. They urge that the Persians have had their Magi, the Babylonians or Assyrians their Chaldaeans, and the Indians their Gymnosophists; and among the Celts and Gauls there are the people called Druids or Holy Ones, for which they cite as authorities the Magicus of Aristotle and Sotion in the twenty-third[*](The alteration of the numeral from 23 to 13 is supported by what little we know of Sotion’s work. It was from a similar source that Clement of Alexandria must have taken what we find in Strom. i. 71 concerning Chaldaeans, Druids, Magians, Gymnosophists, and other barbarian philosophers.) book of his Succession of Philosophers. Also they say that Mochus was a Phoenician, Zamolxis a Thracian, and Atlas a Libyan.

If we may believe the Egyptians, Hephaestus was the son of the Nile, and with him philosophy began, priests and prophets being its chief exponents.