Leontion

Leontion (Latin: Leontium, Greek: Λεόντιον; fl. 300 BC) was a Greek Epicurean philosopher.

Leontion was a pupil of Epicurus and his philosophy. She was the companion of Metrodorus of Lampsacus.^[1] The information we have about her is scant. She was said to have been a hetaera – a courtesan or prostitute.^[2]

Diogenes Laërtius has preserved a line from a letter that Epicurus evidently wrote to Leontion, in which Epicurus praises her for her well-written arguments against certain philosophical views (which aren't mentioned in Diogenes' quote).^[3] According to Pliny, she was painted by Aristides of Thebes in a work entitled "Leontion thinking of Epicurus."^[4]

According to Cicero, Leontion is said to have published arguments criticizing the famous philosopher Theophrastus:

Leontium, that mere courtesan, who had the effrontery to write a riposte to Theophrastus – mind you, she wrote elegantly in good Attic, but still, this was the licence which prevailed in the Garden of Epicurus.^[5]

This anecdote was later adopted by Pliny, in the preface of his Naturalis historia.^[6]