He accumulated untold wealth through trade and piracy, funding an extensive construction program and a court which attracted such luminaries as Aesop, the storyteller, and Pythagoras, the mathematician (a local Samian, who later fled the island to escape Polycrates's cruelty).
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He was able to fund an extensive construction program because of his wealth.
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The court was not attractive to such luminaries as Aesop and Pythagoras.