"Socrates (470-399 BC), the most famous Ancient Greek philosopher, was sentenced to death by the Athenian assembly in 399 BC for atheism and corrupting the young men of the city. Why a thinker who has been revered for millennia afterwards should have met such a fate is but one of the 'Socrates problems' addressed in this study. Here, Socrates' philosophy is placed firmly in the context of the world, and the city, Athens, in which he lived. It is this background that sheds light upon his fate, despite the absence of any writings by Socrates himself. His influence on future thinkers such as Montaigne, Nietzsche and Kierkegaard is also examined."--BOOK JACKET.