Whoops. Herodotus, Father of History Found to Be a Fibber

[Doc Reeves 6434]

Maybe.

 

https://www.thiscityknows.com/herodotus-so-called-father-of-history-provided-a-false-account-of-5th-century-b-c-battle/

“…According to a new study, the famed ancient Greek historian, Herodotus, lied about a pivotal battle between the Greeks and the Carthaginians. The false account is provided in The Histories, Herodotus’ work that is considered the founding work of history in Western literature. 

In the book, the historian detailed, among other things, the First Battle of Himera on Sicily in 480 B.C. He wrote that when the ‘barbarian’ Carthaginians turned against the Greek colony of Himera, a coalition of Greek allies from other Sicilian cities joined the fight, contributing to a Greek victory….”

[elfenix 34744]

his other nickname is "father of lies" for a reason.

[Nivek 17405]

That the ancient Greeks used mercenaries is hardly news.    I do wonder about their claims though.  If the mercenaries were used given a more dangerous job there could be higher fatalities from those units than from the armored hoplites from other Greek city-states.    I don't recall the time period, but from what I recall, early Greek hoplite battles had relatively low mortality than later battles and it was a huge shift when they started not allowing the battle's losers to bury their dead or started killing everyone in defeated cities.