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[1]
I return now to that place in my history where it earlier left off. 1 The Lacedaemonians were the first to be informed that the king was equipping himself to attack Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas; with this knowledge it was that they sent to the oracle at Delphi [22.5167,38.4917] (Perseus) Delphi, where they received the answer about which I spoke a little while ago. Now the way in which they were informed of this was strange.
I return now to that place in my history where it earlier left off. 1 The Lacedaemonians were the first to be informed that the king was equipping himself to attack Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas; with this knowledge it was that they sent to the oracle at Delphi [22.5167,38.4917] (Perseus) Delphi, where they received the answer about which I spoke a little while ago. Now the way in which they were informed of this was strange.
[2]
Demaratus son of
Ariston, an exile among the
Medes, was, as I suppose (reason being also my ally), no friend to the
Lacedaemonians, and I leave it to be imagined whether what he did was done out of goodwill or spiteful triumph. When
Xerxes was resolved to march against
Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas,
Demaratus, who was then at
Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa and had knowledge of this, desired to send word of it to the
Lacedaemonians.
[3] He, however, feared detection and had no other way of informing them than this trick:—taking a double tablet, he scraped away the wax from it, and then wrote the king's plan on the wood. Next he melted the wax back again over the writing, so that the bearer of this seemingly blank tablet might not be troubled by the way-wardens.
[4] When the tablet came to
Sparta [22.416,37.83] (inhabited place), Laconia, Peloponnese, Greece, Europe Lacedaemon, the
Lacedaemonians could not guess its meaning, until at last (as I have been told)
Gorgo,
Cleomenes' daughter and
Leonidas' wife, discovered the trick herself and advised them to scrape the wax away so that they would find writing on the wood. When they did so, they found and read the message, and presently sent it to the rest of the
Greeks. This is the story, as it is told.
Histories. Herodotus. ed. A.D. Godley. Cambridge. 1920-1925.
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