Aristotle was born in 384 BCE in Stagira in northern Greece. His father was court physician to the king of Macedonia. At seventeen Aristotle went to Athens to attend Plato’s Academy, which became his home for the next twenty years. He was the Academy’s star pupil, but also fiercely independent. That may be why, when Plato died in 347 BCE, Plato’s nephew Speusippus was chosen to head the Academy. Aristotle went back to Macedonia, becoming court tutor to the young Alexander, later to be Great.
