Pythagorus The Greek mathematician Pythagoras was born in 572 BC. He founded a school which became an academy for the study of philosophy, mathematics, and the natural sciences. The school became something of a cult, with Pythagoras as its leader. As a consequence, many of the discoveries made there were automatically attributed to him. The group was fascinated with numbers and number theory, looking for ways to mathematically describe patterns in music, astronomy, geometry, and logic. So famous were their discoveries to become, that their program of study became the basis for a liberal arts education for more than 2000 years. Close this window