Book 7, Ch. 226.
“
Before battle was joined they say that someone from Trachis warned him how many Persians there were by saying that when they fired their bows, they hid the sun with the mass of arrows. Dianeces, so the story goes, was so dismissive of the Persian numbers that he calmly replied, "All to the good, my friend from Trachis. If the Persians hide the sun, the battle will be in shade rather than sunlight."
— Herodotus
What It Means
This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "Before battle was joined they say that someone from Trachis warned him how many Persians there were by saying that when they fired their bows, they hid the sun with the mass of arrows. Dianeces, so the story goes, was so dismissive of the Persian numbers that he calmly replied, "All to the good, my friend from Trachis. If the Persians hide the sun, the battle will be in shade rather than sunlight."" in the context of "Book 7, Ch. 226." to mean that wisdom is timeless.
Source: Wikiquote: "Herodotus" (The Histories)
The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
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About Herodotus
Herodotus of Halicarnassus (Greek: Ἡρόδοτος, Hēródotos) (c. 484 BC – c. 425 BC) was a historian, known for his writings on the conflict between Greece and Persia, as well as the descriptions he wrote of different places and people he met on his travels.
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