Diogenes of Sinope

Diogenes of Sinope was the most famous of the Cynics, who made his philosophy a public performance. He lived in extreme poverty — in a great storage jar, owning nothing but a cloak and a staff — to show that happiness needs almost nothing, and mocked the conventions of society as so much vanity. The stories are legion: he walked the market with a lantern by day, 'looking for an honest man'; told Alexander the Great, who offered him any favour, only to stand out of his light.

Called 'the Dog' (kynikos), he embraced the name, living shamelessly 'according to nature' in defiance of custom. His radical self-sufficiency and his ethic of virtue through hardship passed directly into Stoicism.