For the Raphael painting, see The School of AthensThe Academy was founded by Plato in ca. 387 BC in Athens. It persisted throughout the Hellenistic period as a sceptical school, turning dogmatic again following the death of Philo of Larissa in 83 BC. After a short-lived revival by Cassius Dionysius Longinus in the 3rd century AD, the Academy was re-established in AD 410 as a center of Neoplatonism, persisting until AD 529 when it was finally closed down by Justinian I.
The Platonic Academy may be compared to Aristotle's Lyceum.
Before the Akademia was a school, and even before Cimon enclosed its precincts with a wall,[1] it contained a sacred grove of olive trees dedicated to Athena, the goddess of wisdom, outside the city walls of ancient Athens.[2] The archaic name for the site was Hekademia, which by classical times evolved into Akademia and was explained, at least as early as the beginning of the 6th century BC, by linking it to an Athenian hero, a legendary "Akademos".
