ACADEMY, in antiquity, a garden, villa, or grove, situated within a mile of Athens, where Plato and his followers held their philosophical conferences. It took its name from one Academus, or Ecademus, who was the original owner of it, and made it a kind of gymnasium. He lived in the time of Theseus; and, after his death, it retained his name, and was consecrated to his memory. Cimon embellished it with fountains, trees, and walks; but Sylla, during the siege of Athens, employed these very trees in making battering engines against the city. Cicero too had his villa, or place of retirement, near Pozzuoli, which he also named an academy, where he composed his Academical Questions, and his book De Natura Deorum.