Herodotus
(c.484-425BC)

The "Father of History" was born in Halicarnassus (today's Turkey). He was exiled from his city after having conspired against the Persian rule, and went to Samos.
Herodotus was to make journeys to places like Asia Minor, Babylonia, Egypt and Greece during his lifetime, and he wrote about the different people and cultures he met.
It was Herodotus who was the first person to speak about the idea of the free men of the west against the slaves of the east.
At the age of about 37 he went to Athens, and won the admiration of many people, including Pericles and his good friend Sophocles.
A few years later he settled in southern Italy, in the Greek colony Thurii. He was to spent the rest of his life working on his History, which describes the history and civilization of the ancient world.
Herodotus tried to achieve objectivity and tried to separate what he held for true and what he thought was unprobable.
He founded the grounds for historiography in trying to draw moral lessons from various events, showing for example how the gods punish the arrogant.