SOURCE: "The Greek Historians: Herodotus," in The English Epic and Its Background, Oxford University Press, 1954, pp. 41-51.

Tillyard was a scholar of English literature best known for his work on Shakespeare and the English Renaissance. In the following essay, Tillyard provides a concise overview of the History, addressing the epic character of Herodotus's writing, and calling him "the authentic voice of the Greek world in its expansive phase. "

For someone intending to treat history philosophically the study of Herodotus is sufficient. There he will find everything that has gone into the making of all subsequent world history: the activity, the foolishness, the suffering, and the fate of the human race. (Schopenhauer)

Herodotus was akin to Homer in more ways than one. He was a native of the Asia Minor coast, and, though citizen of a Dorian city, the vehicle of Ionian culture. Like Homer he used the Ionic...