Tom Holland

Thank you very much.

and action.

And a classic example of this from British history, the rise of the House of Wessex, the family of Alfred the Great and his heirs, who between them established the United Kingdom of England.

Based on Lloyd's internal customer data from March 2026.

And I thought you rendered it beautifully, especially the hint of the eunuch in the servant.

No, it was very good.

Yeah, so Herodotus, the first historian, and his great work takes as its theme the story of how the Persian Empire in the early decades of the fifth century BC tries to conquer Greece and ultimately fails.

And what Herodotus is giving us in that passage is the moment when the Persian invasions of Greece become inevitable.

It's the kind of key turning point in the drama of his great story.

So what is going on here?

The Athenians have crossed from Greece.

They've crossed the Aegean and they have joined forces with other Greeks called the Ionians who live on what is now the Aegean coastline of Turkey.

And they are subjects of the Persian king because, of course, they are in Asia and the Persians lay claim to the rule of Asia.

or at least they had been subjects of the Persian king because actually they've risen in rebellion and the Athenians have been persuaded by the Ionian leader to join them in this insurrection.

And they've marched inland from the Aegean coast with the Ionians and they've attacked the great city of Sardis, which is the capital of the Persian governor who kind of administers the region for the great king.

And

The Persian governor retreats to the Acropolis, so the kind of the upper fortress of Sardis and holds out there.

The Athenians and the Ionians can't capture that, but they are able to capture the rest of the city and they torch it.

Everything goes up in flames.

Including one of the most famous buildings in the whole of the Persian Empire.