Herodotus Quotes

It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey; and these are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed.

From Peloponnesos (came) the Lakedaimonians..., the Corinthians..., the Sikyonians..., the Epidaurians..., the Troiezenians... All these (groups)... belong to the Dorian and Macedonian nation (and) had emigrated last from Erineus and Pindos and Dryopis.

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

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

I am going to talk at some length about Egypt, because it has very many remarkable features and has produced more monuments which beggar description than anywhere else in the world.

It was a kind of Cadmean victory.

It is the gods' custom to bring low all things of surpassing greatness.

Some men give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal; while others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting, at the last moment, more vigorous efforts than ever before.

"At sea your men will be as far inferior to Greeks as women are to men." (By Artemisa, the best persian warrior in Salamina, a very courageous woman. A superbe irony!).

When life is so burdensome death has become a sought after refuge.

Tell your king (Xerxes), who sent you, how his Greek viceroy (Alexander I) of Macedonia has received you hospitably.

The king's might is greater than human, and his arm is very long.

My men have turned into women and my women into men!

It is sound planning that invariably earns us the outcome we want; without it, even the gods are unlikely to look with favour on our designs.

Call no man happy till he dies.