Chapter 13

THE MANDATE

Fearing however, lest the name of philosophy should be entirely exterminated from among mankind, and that they should, on this account, incur the indignation of the Gods by suffering so great a gift of theirs to perish, they made a collection of certain commentaries and symbols, gathered the writings of the more ancient Pythagoreans, and of such things as they remembered. These relics each left at his death to his son, or daughter, or wife, with a strict injunction not to divulge them outside the family. This was carried out for some time, and the relics were transmitted in succession to their posterity.

—From The Life of Pythagoras, by the Neoplatonic philosopher Iamblichus (c. AD 250–c. 325)

The news from Croton could not have been more devastating. Archippus was dumbfounded. He sat motionless under the olive tree, one of the hundreds that dotted the hill overlooking the splendid harbor and the gulf beyond. All life seemed to have drained from his body, his left hand covering his face and the other still holding the papyrus scroll that his servant had just delivered.

Archippus was a mathematiko, a member of Pythagoras’ inner circle of disciples. He had come to Tarentum, his birthplace and one of Greater Greece’s principal cities, to attend to some family business that had kept him at his mother’s house longer than expected. As he now began to realize, that delay might have saved his life.

The scroll was a letter from Lysis, one of his closest friends. It brought “the saddest of news”: the Master had perished. With an unsteady hand and hoping that his letter would reach Archippus before his departure back to Croton, Lysis had written to his friend all about the circumstances that had led to Pythagoras’ tragic death. Just as Lysis had feared, the vindictive Cylon had sent his followers to carry out a cowardly attack on the fraternity. The Pythagoreans were holding council at the house of Milo, the famous Crotonian athlete and general of the victorious army that defeated Sybaris, when Cylon’s henchmen set the building on fire. In order to provide a means for their master to escape, Pythagoras’ disciples had thrown themselves into the flames and made a bridge with their bodies. But the mob outside had blocked the gate, and by the time those trapped inside the house finally forced it open, many had died, either burned or suffocated, the Master among them.

The flames, the scorching heat, the screams; Lysis had gone through all that before in his all-too-real premonitory dreams. How many besides him and Dimachus had managed to escape alive? He didn’t know. All he knew was that he was still in danger, for he was convinced Cylon wouldn’t stop until he wiped out the entire fraternity.

He had hurriedly left the city, taking with him only a few belongings. “I’m on my way to Thebes,” he wrote, “carrying a most precious document in the Master’s own hand that he entrusted to me. For reasons I cannot disclose, this scroll must be protected at all costs, and for that purpose I shall need your help.” The letter ended with a promise to write again soon and an appeal to his friend not to return to Croton but to join him in Thebes instead.

The sun was rapidly sinking behind the hills, its last rays setting the upper branches of the olive trees ablaze when Archippus got up and began walking back to the house. He had devoted the best part of his life to the fraternity and could hardly contemplate a future without it. But even less could he bear the thought of the Master’s teachings and marvelous discoveries being extinguished forever.

Lysis had mentioned a document. Perhaps the Master, anticipating his demise, had left behind instructions for the preservation of his doctrines. Archippus made up his mind: he would go to Thebes to join Lysis. The name of philosophy would not be allowed to perish.