Histories

Herodotus

Herodotus. Godley, Alfred Denis, translator. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press; William Heinemann, Ltd., 1920-1925 (printing).

These won the most renown of all who fought at Plataea [23.2667,38.2] (Perseus) Plataea. For Callicrates, who, when he came to the army, was the finest not only of the Lacedaemonians, but also of all the other Greeks, died away from the battle. Callicrates, who was sitting in his place when Pausanias was offering sacrifice, was wounded in the side by an arrow.

While his comrades were fighting, he was carried out of the battle and died a lingering death, saying to Arimnestus, a Plataean, that it was not a source of grief to him to die for Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas' sake; his sorrow was rather that he had struck no blow and achieved no deed worthy of his merit, despite all his eager desire to do so.