Agastya

1500 BCE – 1200 BCE

Southern peninsular India (traditional)

Vedic and pan-Indian sage whose broad tradition links hymnic authority, ascetic discipline, grammar, natural knowledge, and religious philosophy.

Ajita Keśakambalin

550 BCE – 450 BCE

Magadha region

Magadhan sramana materialist who denied afterlife, karmic fruit, ritual efficacy, and a soul separable from the body.

Atri

1500 BCE – 1200 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (Vedic heartland)

Vedic rishi and Atreya-lineage seer associated with Rigveda Mandala 5 whose hymns join ritual praise, cosmic order, truth, healing, restraint, compassion, natural observation, and Vedic theology.

Bādarāyaṇa (Vyāsa)

500 BCE – 420 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (traditional)

Indian sage-philosopher traditionally identified with Vyāsa and Bādarāyaṇa, linked to Vedānta, the Brahma Sūtras, epic philosophical teaching, Brahman, self, liberation, scripture, reason, and the metaphysical interpretation of Vedic revelation.

Bharadvāja

1280 BCE – 1200 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (traditional)

Vedic rishi and Bharadvāja-family seer associated with Rigveda Mandala 6 whose hymns to Agni, Indra, Sarasvatī, Pūṣan, the Aśvins, dawn, cosmic order, and ritual power shaped Vedic theology, sacred speech, sacrificial ethics, poetic knowledge, and early Indian philosophy of religion.

Confucius

551 BCE – 479 BCE

Zou, Lu (near Qufu, Shandong)

Ancient Chinese teacher from the state of Lu whose account of learning, ritual, humane conduct, music, names, family reverence, and virtuous government became the center of the Confucian tradition.

Dīrghatamas Āucathya

1135 BCE – 1065 BCE

Eastern Indo-Gangetic region (Anga tradition)

Rigvedic seer associated with hymns 1.140-1.164, especially the riddle-cosmology of 1.164, where speech, mind, number, divine multiplicity, and hidden order become philosophical poetry.

Dong Zhongshu

179 BCE – 104 BCE

Guangchuan / Wencheng, Hebei

Western Han Confucian thinker from Guangchuan, remembered for joining Gongyang classicism, Heaven-human resonance, yin-yang and Five Phases cosmology, moral rulership, and imperial Confucian policy.

Gārgī Vācaknavī

700 BCE – 600 BCE

Videha / Mithilā region

Early Upanishadic woman philosopher from the Videha-Mithilā setting whose public questions to Yājñavalkya press inquiry toward the imperishable ground of world, speech, and knowledge.

Gautama (Akṣapāda)

200 BCE – 100 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region / early Nyāya milieu

Early Nyāya philosopher traditionally credited with the Nyāya Sūtra, whose analytic program systematized inference, debate, valid knowledge, realist categories, self, error, and liberation.

Gautama (Rāhūgaṇa)

1500 BCE – 1200 BCE

Indo-Gangetic / early Vedic region

Rigvedic seer associated with the Gotama Rāhūgaṇa hymn block, whose transmitted hymns join praise, sacrifice, speech, divine agency, kingship, auspicious life, and cosmic order.

Gongsun Long

325 BCE – 250 BCE

Zhao state region

Warring States School of Names philosopher of language, logic, names and actualities, white-horse paradox, hard-white distinction, reference, designation, and disputation.

Gṛtsamada

1280 BCE – 1200 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (Vedic tradition)

Rigvedic seer associated chiefly with the Mandala 2 hymn family, where sacred speech, rta, ritual knowledge, poetic form, and Vedic cosmology meet inside early Indian religious-philosophical reflection.

Han Fei

280 BCE – 233 BCE

Han state (Xinzheng region)

Warring States Chinese Legalist philosopher and statesman whose Han Feizi synthesizes fa, shu, shi, xingming, rewards and punishments, human motivation, and impersonal standards into a classic theory of state power.

Hui Shi

380 BCE – 305 BCE

State of Song, probably the Shangqiu/Henan region

Warring States Chinese School of Names philosopher, disputer, and statesman whose lost Huizi tradition, Ten Theses, law-code story, and Zhuangzi dialogues shaped later debates about names, actualities, identity, difference, space, time, perspective, and public standards.

Jaimini

350 BCE – 300 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region, exact birthplace unknown

Early Indian Mīmāṃsā philosopher credited with the Mīmāṃsā Sūtra, a foundational sūtra text on dharma, Vedic injunction, authorless scripture, ritual action, pramāṇa, śabda, and the interpretation of sacred language.

Kaṇva

1200 BCE – 1100 BCE

probably northern India or the Ganges-Yamuna/Mālinī river tradition; exact birthplace unknown

Vedic rishi and Kaṇva lineage figure associated with Rigvedic hymnody, sacred speech, ritual praise, Kāṇva transmission, and the Śakuntalā āśrama tradition.

Kapila

700 BCE – 600 BCE

probably northern India or the Indo-Gangetic region; exact birthplace unknown

Legendary early Sāṃkhya founder associated with puruṣa, prakṛti, guṇas, discriminative knowledge, liberation, and later Sāṃkhya-pravacana transmission.

Kutsa Āṅgirasa

1200 BCE – 1100 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region, exact birthplace unknown

Vedic rishi and Āṅgirasa lineage figure associated with Rigvedic Indra hymnody, sacred speech, ritual praise, śruti transmission, and early Hindu religious philosophy.

Laozi

600 BCE – 501 BCE

traditionally Ku County, state of Chu, near modern Luyi, Henan; historicity uncertain

Legendary early Daoist figure associated with the Daodejing, Dao, de, wuwei, ziran, simplicity, anti-coercive rule, and later religious Daoist veneration as Taishang Laojun.

Li Si

280 BCE – 208 BCE

Shangcai, State of Chu, now Henan

Qin Legalist statesman whose memorials, centralized statecraft, and script-standardization work helped form the administrative language of the first Chinese empire.

Mahāvīra (Vardhamāna)

599 BCE – 527 BCE

Kuṇḍagrāma near Vaiśālī, Vajji; traditional birthplace

Jain śramaṇa teacher and final tīrthaṅkara associated with ahiṃsā, anekāntavāda, aparigraha, ascetic liberation, kevala-jñāna, and the Jain Āgama teaching tradition.

Maitreyī

800 BCE – 700 BCE

Videha / Mithilā region; Upanishadic setting, exact birthplace unknown

Early Upanishadic woman philosopher whose dialogues with Yājñavalkya ask whether wealth can secure immortality and redirect inquiry toward ātman, self-knowledge, and renunciation.

Makkhali Gośāla

520 BCE – 460 BCE

Śrāvastī region; traditional setting and exact birthplace uncertain

Ancient Indian Ājīvika teacher remembered for niyati, a radical doctrine of fate and fixed transmigration reconstructed from Buddhist and Jain hostile-source evidence.

Mencius (Mengzi)

372 BCE – 289 BCE

Zou, State of Lu

Classical Confucian philosopher whose account of xingshan, the four sprouts, ren, yi, moral cultivation, benevolent government, and people-centered legitimacy shaped East Asian ethics and political thought.

Mozi (Mo Di)

470 BCE – 391 BCE

State of Lu or State of Song, Warring States China

Warring States philosopher of Mohism, jian ai, impartial care, anti-aggression, meritocracy, frugality, Heaven, ghosts, standards, logic, optics, and siege defense.

Prajapati

1200 BCE – 800 BCE

Indo-Gangetic Plain (Vedic tradition)

Vedic creator figure and lord of creatures whose profile joins Hiranyagarbha, Prajapati, tapas, Vac, yajna, sacrifice as creation, Brahmana ritual cosmology, Daksha, Brahma identification, and later Hindu reception.

Purana Kassapa

560 BCE – 480 BCE

Magadha region

Early Indian sramana teacher remembered for akiriyavada, denial of the moral efficacy of action, Magadhan debate culture, the six teachers, and the Samannaphala Sutta report.

Raikva

750 BCE – 700 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region

Upanishadic sage of the Chandogya Upanishad whose Samvarga Vidya joins Janasruti, humility before knowledge, the cart-man motif, Vayu as cosmic absorber, Prana as bodily absorber, food and eater imagery, and Vedic transmission.

Śabara Svāmin

100 BCE – 1 BCE

Indian subcontinent, exact birthplace unknown

Early Mīmāṃsā commentator whose Śabara Bhāṣya shaped Indian philosophy of language and religion through its analysis of Vedic injunction, dharma, śabda, pramāṇa, ritual action, and scriptural authority.

Sanatkumāra

700 BCE – 600 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (symbolic / cosmic teacher)

Upanishadic teacher of Nārada whose Chāndogya dialogue links language, knowledge, sorrow, and bhūman, the infinite fullness beyond finite disciplines.

Sañjaya Belaṭṭhiputta

520 BCE – 450 BCE

Magadha region

Early Indian skeptic associated with Ajñāna and the Sāmaññaphala Sutta, where his remembered replies model suspension of judgment and metaphysical non-commitment.

Satyakāma Jābāla

700 BCE – 600 BCE

Indo-Gangetic region (Pañcāla tradition)

Upanishadic figure whose Chandogya episode treats truthful self-disclosure as the sign of spiritual fitness and a gateway into instruction about Brahman.

Shang Yang

390 BCE – 338 BCE

Wei state region

Chinese Legalist reformer whose Qin reforms and attributed Book of Lord Shang shaped early theories of law, state power, rewards, punishments, agriculture, and war.

Siddhārtha Gautama

563 BCE – 483 BCE

Lumbinī

Founder of Buddhism whose transmitted early discourses frame suffering, liberation, dependent arising, not-self, mindfulness, ethics, and the Middle Way.

Sima Qian

145 BCE – 86 BCE

Longmen (near present-day Hancheng)

Western Han historian and thinker whose Shiji joined ethical judgment, political memory, narrative biography, source criticism, cosmology, and historical method.

Uddālaka Āruṇi

750 BCE – 700 BCE

Kuru-Panchala region

Early Upanishadic teacher of Shvetaketu whose Chandogya teaching joins sat, Atman, subtle essence, visible-to-invisible analogy, tat tvam asi, and later Vedanta reception.

Vasiṣṭha

1270 BCE – 1200 BCE

Rigvedic Bharata-Sudās priestly milieu; Sarasvatī-Paruṣṇī/Punjab horizon, exact birthplace unknown

Rigvedic rishi of the Bharata-Sudās priestly horizon whose Mandala 7 hymn blocks make mantra, sacred speech, Varuṇa theology, Sarasvatī, ṛta, yajña, and divine-human mediation central to early Vedic ritual philosophy.

Viśvāmitra

1265 BCE – 1195 BCE

Rigvedic Bharata-Kuśika milieu; Vipāś-Śutudrī/Sarasvatī-Punjab horizon, exact birthplace unknown

Rigvedic rishi of the Bharata-Kuśika horizon whose Mandala 3 hymn blocks make mantra, sacred speech, ṛta, yajña, tapas, and divine-human mediation central to early Vedic ritual philosophy.

Xunzi

313 BCE – 238 BCE

State of Zhao, north-central China; exact birthplace uncertain

Late Warring States Confucian philosopher whose received Xunzi corpus argues that learning, ritual, music, names, cultivated artifice, and institutions transform unruly human tendencies into moral and political order.

Yājñavalkya

760 BCE – 685 BCE

Videha / Mithilā region; Upanishadic setting, exact birthplace unknown

Late Vedic and early Upanishadic philosopher remembered for Śukla Yajurveda transmission, Bṛhadāraṇyaka debates with Janaka, Gārgī, and Maitreyī, and teachings on ātman, Brahman, renunciation, and dharma.

Zhuangzi

369 BCE – 286 BCE

Meng, state of Song, now near Shangqiu, Henan; exact site uncertain

Warring States Daoist philosopher whose received Zhuangzi tradition uses parable, skepticism, transformation, spontaneity, and perspectival reasoning to loosen fixed distinctions and reorient life toward wandering with dao.