Note 51 — Chapter IV · PERSIAN OPERATIONS IN EUROPE: B.C. 493–490. MARATHON.

The all but complete absence of any details of Miltiades’ life between the time of the Scythian expedition and the end of the Ionian Revolt seems to me to support the view that there is very little documentary evidence underlying Herodotus’ history, save that of inscriptions and of other official documents, demonstrable instances of whose use are rare. Had the historian made large use of private memoirs, supposing such existed, it is unlikely that he would have omitted to have recourse to the records of the Philaid family.