Name: The Histories
ISBN: 9781515427032

The Histories

Herodotus is not only the father of the art and the science of historical writing but also one of the Western tradition's most compelling storytellers. In tales such as that of Gyges—who murders Candaules, the king of Lydia, and unsurps his throne and his marriage bed, thereby bringing on, generations later, war with the Persians—he laid bare the intricate human entanglements at the core of great historical events. In his love for the stranger, more marvelous facts of the world, he infused his magnificent history with a continuous awareness of the mythic and the wonderful.

What Hacker News says

jihadjihadMay 2025

OT wrt. TFA, but per your comment--for anyone who hasn't read Herodotus's Histories, do yourself a favor and pick it up. Great storytelling and thought provoking throughout.

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topologieFeb 2022

- Herodotus: The Histories (Landmark Series version highly recommended).

- Any book by Nassim Taleb (I'd recommend starting with Antifragile).

- The Count of Monte Cristo (Most fun novel I have ever read).

- Moby Dick or The Whale (One of the top two novels I've ever read).

- Blood Meridian or The Evening Redness in the West (Tied with Moby Dick for best novel I've ever read).

- The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Epic reading... worth the commitment).

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topologieDec 2021

Some of my favorite fiction books:

- Seiobo There Below, by Laszlo Krasznahorkai

- The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas

- Moby Dick, by Herman Melville

- Blood Meridian, by Cormac McCarthy

- Cuentos Completos, by Jorge Luis Borges (or at least the "Labyrinths" compilation)

- A Perfect Vacuum, by Stanislaw Lem (Forewords to Non-Existent Books)

- Imaginary Magnitude, by Stanislaw Lem

- His Master's Voice, by Stanislaw Lem (Along the same lines as Sagan's Contact, but better, way better.)

- Buddha's Little Finger, by Victor Pelevin

Some my favorite "non-fiction" books:

- The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories, edited by Robert Strassler

- The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon

- Antifragile, by Nassim Taleb

- The Black Swan, by Nassim Taleb

- Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, by Douglas Hofstadter

- The Road to Reality, by Roger Penrose

- Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman

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herodotusDec 2021

The Histories by Herodotus was life changing for me (see my handle!). But, be aware that it has to be a good translation: the online free ones are not the ones you should read.

Why? Because until I read it my only other experience with writing of that era was the bible readings from when I attended synagogue (before I realized that there was no god). I always found the bible stuff strange, but I forgave it, because I thought that people were just like that at that time in human history. Well, Herodotus changed my mind. He is brilliant, skeptical, humorous, and inquisitive. Attributes that, until I read the book, I somehow thought belonged to we moderns. Now I know how wrong I was, and I think about things differently.

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Jun8Dec 2021

I wholeheartedly recommend the Landmark Herodotus: https://www.amazon.ca/Landmark-Herodotus-Histories-Robert-St...

The indices, maps, and other additional information was a great aid in understanding the text.

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codybNov 2021

How many people aren’t murdered because of armies though? Humans have been grouping and fighting each other for thousands of years now. You’re under the impression everyone should just… what… pretend it doesn’t happen?

When attacking a neighbor state costs more (because your neighbors have arms too), it’s less likely to happen.

The cold war had plenty of awful hot action with proxies and third parties but the entirely hot version obviously would have been far more calamitous.

I suggest reading Herodotus’ Histories, or you can read up on Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler, Alexander, the Crusades, or the myriad other conquerors and conflicts that have occurred.

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