Seneca

Born in Córdoba, raised in Rome. He became immensely wealthy as adviser to the young emperor Nero — a position he never entirely justified to himself. He wrote tragedies, scientific treatises (Natural Questions), and the great moral essays: On the Shortness of Life, On Anger, On the Tranquility of the Mind, and the 124 Letters to Lucilius that are the most personal Stoic writing we have. When Nero finally turned on him and ordered his suicide, he cut his own veins with composure, dictating to scribes until the end. His letters still read like a friend speaking honestly across two thousand years: about time, money, anger, grief, and how to die well.