The Story of ‘Lyceum’ and ‘Rhapsode’

The background of the name ‘lyceum’

We have named our education company ‘lyceum’ because of the great admiration for Aristotle and the principles he represented. Just read the following story from wikipedia:

In 335 BCE, Athens fell under Macedonian rule and Aristotle, aged 50, returned from Asia. Upon his return, Aristotle began teaching regularly in the morning in the Lyceum and founded an official school called “The Lyceum”. After morning lessons, Aristotle would frequently lecture on the grounds for the public and manuscripts of his compiled lectures were eventually circulated. The group of scholars who followed the Aristotelian doctrine came to be known as the Peripatetics due to Aristotle’s tendency to walk as he taught.

Aristotle’s main focus as a teacher was cooperative research, an idea which he founded through his natural history work and systematic collection of philosophical works to contribute to his library. His students were assigned historical or scientific research projects as part of their studies. The school was also student run. The students elected a new student administrator to work with the school leadership every ten days, allowing all the students to become involved in turn. Before returning to Athens, Aristotle had been the tutor of Alexander of Macedonia, who became the great conqueror Alexander the Great.

In 322 BCE, Aristotle was forced to flee Athens with his family when the political leadership reacted against the Macedonians again and his previously published works supporting Macedonian rule left him a target. He passed on his Lyceum to Theophrastus and died later that year in Chalcis, near his hometown.

The background of the name ‘rhapsode’

Rhapsodes were the rappers of the time of Aristotle – stitching together songs and content to the taste of an audience. They adapted the content! That’s why we thought that Rhapsode would be a great name for our 4th generation adaptive and personalized platform:

The term “rhapsode” is derived from rhapsōidein (ῥαψῳδεῖν), meaning “to sew songs [together]”. This word illustrates how the oral epic poet, or rhapsode, would build a repertoire of diverse myths, tales and jokes to include in the content of the epic poem. Thus it was possible, through experience and improvisatory skills, for him to shift the content of the epos according to the preferred taste of a specific location’s audience. However, the outer framework of the epic would remain virtually the same in every “singing”, thus securing the projection of underlying themes such as of morality or honour. (From Wikipedia)