Cleomenes (; grc-gre, Κλεομένης; fl. c. 300 BCE) was a Cynic philosopher. He was a pupil of Crates of Thebes, and is said to have taught Timarchus of Alexandria and Echecles of Ephesus, the latter of whom would go on to teach Menedemus. He wrote a work on ''Pedagogues'' () from which

Diogenes Laërtius Diogenes Laërtius ( ; grc-gre, Διογένης Λαέρτιος, ; ) was a biographer of the Ancient Greece, Greek philosophers. Nothing is definitively known about his life, but his surviving ''Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers'' is a ...

has preserved an anecdote concerning Diogenes of Sinope:Diogenes Laërtius, vi. 75

Cleomenes in his work on ''Pedagogues'' says that Diogenes' friends wanted to ransom him, for which he called them simpletons, for, he said, lions are not the slaves of those who feed them, but rather those who feed them are at the mercy of the lions, Fear, he added, is the mark of the slave, whereas wild beasts make human beings afraid of them.

The importance of this anecdote is that it is an early reference to the story of Diogenes being captured by

pirates Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...

and being sold into slavery, lending credence to the idea that the story may well be true.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cleomenes the Cynic 3rd-century BC Greek people 3rd-century BC philosophers Cynic philosophers Hellenistic-era philosophers