The boys' and girls' Herodotus
Herodotus (c.484 BCE – 420 BCE) is often called the "Father of History" (as we know it) because he set out to provide objective accounts of recent historical events and try to explain the causes of those events. He did this by harvesting myths, legends, and personal accounts of significant events or events that were rumored to have happened. Herodotus provides analysis and insight that was to be the model for all Western historians to follow. He did not shrink from delving into the personalities and foibles of those who were running the Western world up until his time. He looked deeply and respectfully into the cultures that surrounded Classical Greece. From the introduction: "The personal character of Herodotus, reflected from every page that he wrote, renders his vivid story all the more happily suited to the reading and study of boys and girls. He is as honest as the sun ; equally impartial to friends and foes ; candid in the statement of both sides of a question ; and an artist withal in the gift of delineating a character or a people with a few rapid strokes, so bold and masterly that the sketch is placed before you with stereoscopic distinctness. For so early a writer he presents a surprising unity of plan, combined with a variety of detail that is amazing. "