[49] Herodot. vii, 20-21.
[50] See the enumeration in Herodotus, vii, 61-96. In chapter 76, one name has dropped out of the text (see the note of Wesseling and Schweighäuser), which, in addition to those specified under the head of the land-force, makes up exactly forty-six. It is from this source that Herodotus derives the boast which he puts into the mouth of the Athenians (ix, 27) respecting the battle of Marathon, in which they pretend to have vanquished forty-six nations,—ἐνικήσαμεν ἔθνεα ἓξ καὶ τεσσαράκοντα: though there is no reason for believing that so great a number of contingents were engaged with Datis at Marathon.
Compare the boasts of Antiochus king of Syria. (B. C. 192) about his immense Asiatic host brought across into Greece, as well as the contemptuous comments of the Roman consul Quinctius (Livy, xxxv, 48-49). “Varia enim genera armorum, et multa nomina gentium inauditarum, Dahas, et Medos, et Cadusios, et Elymæos—Syros omnes esse: haud paulo mancipiorum melius, propter servilia ingenia, quam militum genus:” and the sharp remark of the Arcadian envoy Antiochus (Xenophon, Hellen. vii, 1, 33). Quintus Curtius also has some rhetorical turns about the number of nations, whose names even were hardly known, tributary to the Persian empire (iii, 4, 29; iv, 45, 9), “ignota etiam ipsi Dario gentium nomina,” etc.
[51] Herodot. vii, 89-93.
[52] Herodot. vii, 61-81.
[53] The army which Darius had conducted against Scythia is said to have been counted by divisions of ten thousand each, but the process is not described in detail (Herodot. iv, 87).
[54] Herodot. vii, 60, 87, 184. This same rude mode of enumeration was employed by Darius Codomannus a century and a half afterwards, before he marched his army to the field of Issus (Quintus Curtius, iii, 2, 3, p. 24, Mutzel).
[55] Herodot. vii, 89-97.
[56] Herodot. vii, 185-186. ἐπάγων πάντα τὸν ἠῷον στρατὸν ἐκ τῆς Ἀσίης (vii, 157). “Vires Orientis et ultima secum Bactra ferens,” to use the language of Virgil about Antony at Actium.
[57] Even Dahlmann, who has many good remarks in defence of Herodotus, hardly does him justice (Herodot, Aus seinem Buche sein Leben, ch. xxxiv, p. 176).