So after ten years they set out from Eretria [23.8083,38.3917] (Perseus) Eretria and returned home. The first place in Attica [23.5,38.83] (department), Central Greece and Euboea, Greece, Europe Attica which they took and held was Marathon: and while encamped there they were joined by their partisans from the city, and by others who flocked to them from the country—demesmen who loved the rule of one more than freedom. These, then, assembled;

but the Athenians in the city, who while Pisistratus was collecting money and afterwards when he had taken Marathon took no notice of it, did now, and when they learned that he was marching from Marathon against Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens, they set out to attack him.

They came out with all their force to meet the returning exiles. Pisistratus' men encountered the enemy when they had reached the temple of Pallenian Athena in their march from Marathon towards the city, and encamped face to face with them.

There (by the providence of heaven) Pisistratus met Amphilytus the Acarnanian, a diviner, who came to him and prophesied as follows in hexameter verses: “The cast is made, the net spread,The tunny-fish shall flash in the moonlit night.”