- published: 19 Dec 2012
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Gregory Skovoroda, also Hryhorii Skovoroda, or Grigory Skovoroda (Latin: Gregorius Scovoroda, Ukrainian: Григорій Савич Сковорода, Hryhorii Savych Skovoroda; Russian: Григо́рий Са́ввич Сковорода́, Grigory Savvich Skovoroda; 3 December 1722 – 9 November 1794) is regarded as a Ukrainian philosopher as well as a Russian philosopher since his work influenced both cultures and fields of study. He was also a poet, teacher and composer. Skovoroda was of a Ukrainian Cossack background, who lived and worked in the then newly formed Russian Empire, in the region of Sloboda Ukraine, which is today partly in Ukraine and partly in Russia. His significant influence on his contemporaries and succeeding generations and his way of life were universally regarded as Socratic and he was often called a "Socrates."
Skovoroda received his education at the Kiev Mogila Academy in Kiev. Haunted by worldly and spiritual powers, the philosopher led a life of an itinerant thinker-beggar. In his tracts and dialogs, biblical problems overlap with those examined earlier by Plato and the Stoics. Skovoroda's first book was issued after his death in 1798 in Saint Petersburg. Skovoroda's complete works were published for the first time in Saint Petersburg in 1861. Before this edition many of his works existed only in manuscript form.