Tom Holland

But I think none of this is to diminish, I think, the glory of what the Athenians achieved at Marathon.

I think the admiration of the ages is justified.

They were fighting for their liberty, if not necessarily for the liberty of Greece.

And I think that their courage in going down that slope into the plain to meet with an enemy that no Greek army had ever defeated before, I think it is

I mean, if that's not heroic, then nothing is heroic.

And so I think that their victory at marathon, even though it is reductive to cast it as the victory of the West over the East or of Europe over Asia or of freedom over despotism, I think it is a battle that is both epic and glorious.

And, you know, I've found it kind of a stirring narrative since childhood.

And it still stirs me to this day, I have to say.

Dominic, of course, we've talked about this is a battle for freedom and liberty and it's heroic and everything.

Not every war is heroic, is it?

There are wars that are bogged down in mud and stalemate.

Thank you very much.

and action.

And a classic example of this from British history, the rise of the House of Wessex, the family of Alfred the Great and his heirs, who between them established the United Kingdom of England.

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And I thought you rendered it beautifully, especially the hint of the eunuch in the servant.

No, it was very good.

Yeah, so Herodotus, the first historian, and his great work takes as its theme the story of how the Persian Empire in the early decades of the fifth century BC tries to conquer Greece and ultimately fails.

And what Herodotus is giving us in that passage is the moment when the Persian invasions of Greece become inevitable.

It's the kind of key turning point in the drama of his great story.