The Histories of Herodotus is considered one of the seminal works of history in Western literature. Written from the 450s to the 420s BC in theIonic dialect of classical Greek, The Histories serves as a record of the ancient traditions, politics, geography, and clashes of various cultures that were known around the Mediterranean and Western Asia at that time. It is not an impartial record but it remains one of the West's most important sources regarding these affairs. Moreover, it established without precedent the genre and study of history in the Western world, although historical records and chronicles existed beforehand.
Perhaps most importantly, it stands as one of the first, and surviving, accounts of the rise of the Persian Empire, the events of, and causes for, theGreco-Persian Wars between the Achaemenid Empire and the Greek city-states in the 5th century BC. Herodotus portrays the conflict as one between the forces of slavery (the Persians) on the one hand, and freedom (theAthenians and the confederacy of Greek city-states which united against the invaders) on the other.
The Histories was at some point through the ages divided into the nine books of modern editions, conventionally named after the Muses. Herodotus seems to have travelled extensively around the ancient world, conducting interviews and collecting stories for his book. At the beginning ofThe Histories, Herodotus sets out his reasons for writing it:
