Tom Holland

And then he dies with the exhaustion and intoxication of the moment.

Is this story true?

It's not in Herodotus.

It's in much later Greek sources.

But of course, this is what inspires the famous marathon race in the 1896 Olympics.

So it might not be true.

Might not be true.

I mean, I like to think it is.

All these stories, I prefer to think that they are.

And it means that the Battle of Marathon is the only battle to have an Olympic event.

But what we know for sure from Herodotus, whether Pheidippides has gone ahead of them or not, is that the Athenian army, I mean, to quote Herodotus, they raced back to the defence of their city as fast as their legs could carry them.

And astonishingly, they arrived there by late afternoon.

And it's just in the nick of time, because not long after they have turned up in Athens, the Persian fleet glides up towards Phalerum, which is the harbour that serves Athens.

And so the Athenians march down to Phalerum, they draw themselves up in kind of great

bronze lines.

And the Persian fleet lies stationary off the entrance to the harbour at Phalerum, and then the sun sets, it's dusk, the Persian fleet raises anchor, swings round and sails eastwards into the night, and the threat of invasion is over, and Athens is saved.

Yeah, it's a bit like, you know, we did the episode on the American attempt to rescue the hostages in Iran and the helicopter crashes.

And it's, you know, the Iranians inspect the helicopter because it's a way of trying to understand what the Americans can do.

And I think the Spartans are exactly the same, that they're looking at the, you know, the armour and the arms and so on that the Persians have.

And to be honest, they're not very impressed.