Herodotus

Herodotus (c. 485 BC - 425 BC) was the oldest historian of Greece, whom Cicero called the "Father of History". He wrote the "History Of the Persian Invasion of Greece." This first historian of the world was born at Halicarnassus, in Caria, between 490 and 480 BC, traveled over Asia Minor, Egypt, and Syria as far as Babylon, and in his old age recorded with due fidelity the fruits of his observations and inquiries, the main object of his work being to relate the successive stages of the strife between the free civilisation of Greece and the despotic barbarism of Persia for the sovereignty of the world, an interest in which Alexander the Great drew sword in the century following.

Wisdom & Quotes

• It is better to be envied than pitied.

- Histories

• Where wisdom is called for, force is of little use.

- Histories

• Great deeds are usually wrought at great risks.

- Histories

• Haste in every business brings failures.

- Histories

• This is the bitterest pain among men , to have much knowledge but no power.

- Histories

• Power is precarious.

- Histories

• We are less convinced by what we hear than what we see.

- Histories

• Not snow, no, nor rain , nor heat, nor night keeps them from accomplishing their appointed courses with all speed.

- Histories

• I know that human happiness never remains long in the same place.

- Histories

• Happiness is not fame or riches or heroic virtues, but a state that will inspire posterity to think in reflecting upon our life, that it was the life they would wish to live.
• Men trust their ears less than their eyes.

- Histories

• In peace sons bury fathers, but in war fathers bury sons.

- Histories

• From great wrongdoing there are great punishments from the gods.

- Histories

• If a man insisted always on being serious, and never allowed himself a bit of fun and relaxation, he would go mad or become unstable without knowing it.

- Histories

• For if one should propose to all men a choice, bidding them select the best customs from all the customs that there are, each race of men, after examining them all, would select those of his own people; thus all think that their own customs are by far the best.

- Histories

• Haste in every business brings failures.

- Histories

• Circumstances rule men; men do not rule circumstances.

- Histories

• It is the greatest and the tallest of trees that the gods bring low with bolts and thunder. For the gods love to thwart whatever is greater than the rest. They do not suffer pride in anyone but themselves.

Xerxes