Histories

There is a meadow there, where they made a place for buying and marketing; much ground grain frequently came to them from Asia (continent)Asia.

As far as I can judge by conjecture, Xerxes gave the command for this digging out of pride, wishing to display his power and leave a memorial; with no trouble they could have drawn their ships across the isthmus, yet he ordered them to dig a canal from sea to sea, wide enough to float two triremes rowed abreast. The same men who were assigned the digging were also assigned to join the banks of the river Strymon by a bridge.

Thus Xerxes did this. He assigned the Phoenicians and Egyptians to make ropes of papyrus and white flax for the bridges,[*](leuko/linon is apparently not really flax but “Esparto grass,” imported from Spain [-4.000,40.000] (nation), EuropeSpain by the Phoenicians.) and to store provisions for his army, so that neither the army nor the beasts of burden would starve on the march to Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas.