Herodotus: The Most Controversial Historian in History

Herodotus (484–425 BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (modern-day Bodrum, Turkey), which was under Persian control during the 5th century BC. He later became a citizen of Thurii in Magna Graecia (Southern Italy, in the region now known as Calabria). Herodotus is renowned for writing *The Histories*—a work that provides a detailed account of subjects such as the Greco-Persian Wars and the rise of the Achaemenid Empire under Cyrus the Great—and for being the first historian to conduct a systematic investigation of historical events. He was dubbed the "Father of History" (*Pater Historiae*) by the Roman orator Cicero.