Iamblichus was a Syrian Neoplatonist philosopher of Arab origin. He was also the biographer of the Greek mystic, philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras. For Iamblichus, Pythagoras was the supreme philosophical authority. He is known to have written the Collection of Pythagorean Doctrines, which, in ten books, comprised extracts from several ancient philosophers. Only the first four books, and fragments of the fifth, survive.