Successful recreations have been performed by Anthemius of Tralles ( 6th century AD ), Proclus ( 6th century ) ( who by this means purportedly destroyed the fleet of Vitellus besieging Constantinople ), Ibn Sahl in his On Burning Mirrors and Lenses ( 10th century ), Alhazen in his Book of Optics ( 1021 ), Roger Bacon ( 13th century ), Giambattista della Porta and his friends ( 16th century ), Athanasius Kircher and Gaspar Schott ( 17th century ), the Comte du Buffon in 1740 in Paris, Ioannis Sakas in the 1970s in Greece, and others.

Saint Proclus, Patriarch of Constantinople ( 434-446 ), hoping to bring about the reconciliation of these Johannites, preached a homily praising his predecessor in the Church of Hagia Sophia.

Proclus Lycaeus (; 8 February 412 – 17 April 485 AD ), called the Successor ( Greek, Próklos ho Diádokhos ), was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Classical philosophers ( see Damascius ).

In this work, Proclus also listed the first mathematicians associated with Plato: a mature set of mathematicians ( Leodamas of Thasos, Archytas of Taras, and Theaetetus ), a second set of younger mathematicians ( Neoclides, Eudoxus of Cnidus ), and a third yet younger set ( Amyntas, Menaechmus and his brother Dinostratus, Theudius of Magnesia, Hermotimus of Colophon and Philip of Opus ).

( Ref Opus cit Butler ) A certain Proclus ( or Proculus ), who had confessed the faith before the prosecutors and underwent torments in defence of it, subsequently was seduced into heresy by Asclepiodotus and Theodotus the banker, both disciples of Theodotus the Tanner, whom Victor, Zephyrinus's predecessor in the Chair of Peter, had excommunicated for reviving the heresy of Ebion that affirmed that Christ was only a mere man, though a prophet.

Born in Constantinople around 420, he went to Alexandria to study in the school of the Neoplatonic philosopher Proclus ; among his fellow students there were Marcellinus ( magister militum and governor of Illyricum ), Flavius Illustrius Pusaeus ( Praetorian prefect of the East and Consul in 467 ), Messius Phoebus Severus ( Consul in 470 and praefectus urbi ), and Pamprepius ( Pagan poet ).

* Neoplatonism: Plotinus ( Egyptian ), Ammonius Saccas, Porphyry ( Syrian ), Zethos ( Arab ), Iamblichus ( Syrian ), Proclus

During the seven years when he was prevented from teaching, he produced, besides the Fragments, the edition of the works of Proclus ( 6 vols., 1820-1827 ), and the works of René Descartes ( II vols., 1826 ).

On the death of Sisinnius, the famous Nestorius succeeded as Archbishop of Constantinople ( 428 – 431 ), and early in 429, on a festival of the Theotokos ( Virgin Mary ), Proclus preached his celebrated sermon on the Incarnation, which was later inserted in the beginning of the Acts of the Council of Ephesus.

It reflects neo-Platonic / Platonic speculation ( which is represented in Porphyry, Libanius, Proclus, and Julian ), as well as Classical cult practice.

Proclus introduces Euclid only briefly in his fifth-century Commentary on the Elements, as the author of Elements, that he was mentioned by Archimedes, and that when King Ptolemy asked if there was a shorter path to learning geometry than Euclid's Elements, " Euclid replied there is no royal road to geometry.

The only reference that historians rely on of Euclid having written the Elements was from Proclus, who briefly in his Commentary on the Elements ascribes Euclid as its author.

During the 19th century modernist Catholics too came generally to accept that the author must have lived after the time of Proclus.

The central poem of Book III is a summary of Proclus ' Commentary on the Timaeus, and Book V contains the important principle of Proclus that things are known not according to their own nature, but according to the character of the knowing subject.

* Proclus ' Commentary on Euclid, Book I. PDF scans of Friedlein's Greek edition, now in the public domain ( Classical Greek )

See also Van den Berg, Proclus ' Commentary, p. 49, with reference to Plutarch, On the E at Delphi .</ ref > Neoplatonists sometimes interpreted the Eleusinian Mysteries as a fabula of celestial phenomena:

The first recorded use of the Greek word translated trapezoid ( τραπέζοειδη, trapézoeide, " table-like ") was by Marinus Proclus ( 412 to 485 AD ) in his Commentary on the first book of Euclid's Elements.

* Proclus, in his Commentary on Plato's Timaeus ( II, 38, I )

He was a pupil of Proclus in Athens, and taught at Alexandria for most of his life, writing commentaries on Plato, Aristotle, and other philosophers.

His work, a commentary on Plato's Timaeus, is lost, but Proclus, a Neoplatonist of the fifth century AD, reports on it.

Another passage from Proclus ' commentary on the Timaeus gives a description of the geography of Atlantis: That an island of such nature and size once existed is evident from what is said by certain authors who investigated the things around the outer sea.

* Proclus, A commentary on the First Book of Euclid's Elements, translated by Glenn Raymond Morrow, Princeton University Press, 1992.

Later ancient commentators such as Proclus ( 410 – 485 CE ) treated many questions about infinity as issues demanding proof and, e. g., Proclus claimed to prove the infinite divisibility of a line, based on a proof by contradiction in which he considered the cases of even and odd numbers of points constituting it.

The majority of Proclus ' works are commentaries on dialogues of Plato ( Alcibiades, Cratylus, Parmenides, Republic, Timaeus ).

Proclus also wrote an influential commentary on the first book of Euclid's Elements of Geometry.

In his commentary on Plato's Timaeus Proclus explains the role the Soul as a principle has in mediating the Forms in Intellect to the body of the material world as a whole.

Another important source for the influence of Proclus on the Middle Ages is Boethius ' Consolation of Philosophy, which has a number of Proclus principles and motifs.

Modern scholarship on Proclus essentially begins with E. R.

The following epigram is engraved on the tomb which houses Proclus and his master Syrianus:

The crater Proclus on the Moon is named after him.

The study was eidetic, approaching the philosophical objectives sought by considering it from each aspect of the quadrivium within the general structure demonstrated by Proclus, namely arithmetic and music on the one hand, and geometry and cosmology on the other.

Averroes rejected Avicenna's Neoplatonism which was partly based on the works of neo-Platonic philosophers, Plotinus and Proclus, that were mistakenly attributed to Aristotle.

Neither did he have any share, as was wrongly ascribed to him, in the First Council of Ephesus of 431, though, in consequence of disputes which arose in Armenia between the followers of Nestorius and the disciples of Acathius of Melitene and Rabbula, Isaac and his church did appeal to Constantinople and through Saint Proclus obtained the desired explanations.

A summary of Proclus ' Elements of Theology circulated under the name Liber de Causis ( the Book of Causes ).

The Liber de Causis ( Book of Causes ) is not a work by Proclus, but a summary of his work the Elements of Theology, likely written by an Arabic interpreter.

Proclus was cited by Cotton Mather in his work entitled Psalterium Americanum ( a commentary on the Book of Psalms ) for his view on the book of Psalms.

Pappus also wrote commentaries on Euclid's Elements ( of which fragments are preserved in Proclus and the Scholia, while that on the tenth Book has been found in an Arabic manuscript ), and on Ptolemy's Ἁρμονικά ( Harmonika ).

The few historical references to Euclid were written centuries after he lived, by Proclus and Pappus of Alexandria.

Proclus, a Greek mathematician who lived several centuries after Euclid, wrote in his commentary of the Elements: " Euclid, who put together the Elements, collecting many of Eudoxus ' theorems, perfecting many of Theaetetus ', and also bringing to irrefragable demonstration the things which were only somewhat loosely proved by his predecessors ".

Proclus ( the commentator on Euclid ) and Hero of Alexandria ( the last of the engineers of antiquity ) also mention him.

Euclid is said to have replied to King Ptolemy's request for an easier way of learning mathematics that " there is no Royal Road to geometry ," following Proclus.

The only evidence comes from traditions recorded in works such as Proclus ’ commentary on Euclid written centuries later.

Pythagoras is widely credited with recognizing the mathematical basis of musical harmony and, according to Proclus ' commentary on Euclid, he discovered the theory of proportionals and constructed regular solids.

The curve was alluded to by Proclus in his commentary on Euclid and attributed to Diocles by Geminus as early as the beginning of the 1st century.