learned by showing that he knew what they knew also." Then I
thought the priest was making game and sport, saying first that
Herodotus could know no poet whom he had not learned at school, and
then saying that all the men of his time well knew this poet, "about
whom everyone was talking." But the priest seemed not to know that
Herodotus and Sophocles were friends, which is proved by this, that
Sophocles wrote an ode in praise of Herodotus.

Then he went on, and though I were to write with a hundred hands
(like Briareus, of whom Homer makes mention) I could not tell you
all the things that the priest said against Herodotus, speaking
truly, or not truly, or sometimes correctly and sometimes not, as
often befalls mortal men. For Herodotus, he said, was chiefly
concerned to steal the lore of those who came before him, such as
Hecataeus, and then to escape notice as having stolen it. Also he
said that, being himself cunning and deceitful, Herodotus was easily
beguiled by the cunning of others, and believed in things manifestly
false, such as the story of the Phoenix-bird.

Then I spoke, and said that Herodotus himself declared that he could
not believe that story; but the priest regarded me not. And he said
that Herodotus had never caught a crocodile with cold pig, nor did
he ever visit Assyria, nor Babylon, nor Elephantine; but, saying
that he had been in these lands, said that which was not true. He
also declared that Herodotus, when he travelled, knew none of the
Fat Ones of the Egyptians, but only those of the baser sort. And he
called Herodotus a thief and a beguiler, and "the same with intent
to deceive," as one of their own poets writes. And, to be short,
Herodotus, I could not tell you in one day all the charges which are
now brought against you; but concerning the truth of these things,