Zeno of Elea was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher. He was a student of Parmenides and one of the Eleatics. Born in Elea, Zeno defended his instructor's belief in monism, the idea that only one single entity exists that makes up all of reality. He rejected the existence of space, time, and motion. To disprove these concepts, he developed a series of paradoxes to demonstrate why these are impossible. Though his original writings are lost, subsequent descriptions by Plato, Aristotle, Diogenes Laertius, and Simplicius of Cilicia have allowed study of his ideas.

Velia was the Roman name of an ancient city on the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is located near the modern village of Novi Velia near Ascea in the Province of Salerno, Italy.