Xenophanes of Colophon

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(c. 570-478 BC) Early Presocratic philosopher. Xenophanes left Ionia at the age of 25, and lived in exile largely in Sicily. He is treated by Plato as a founder of the Eleatics. He is philosophically important for his criticism of the anthropomorphic religion of Hesiod and Homer, and the substitution of a single, eternal, and spiritual deity. He is also remembered for his attack on the conventional military and athletic virtues of the time, in favour of those of the intellect. He was hailed as an honourable, semi-sceptical forerunner by later classical sceptics.