7.114.1
After using these enchantments and many others besides on the river, they passed over it at the Nine Ways in Edonian country, note by the bridges which they found thrown across the Strymon. When they learned that Nine Ways was the name of the place, they buried alive that number of boys and maidens, children of the local people.
7.114.2
To bury people alive is a Persian custom; I have learned by inquiry that when Xerxes' wife Amestris reached old age, she buried twice seven sons of notable Persians as an offering on her own behalf to the fabled god beneath the earth.
ch. 115
7.115.1
Journeying from the Strymon, the army passed by Argilus, a Greek town standing on a stretch of coast further westwards; the territory of this town and that which lies inland of it are called Bisaltia.
7.115.2
From there, keeping on his left hand the gulf off Poseideion, Xerxes traversed the plain of Syleus (as they call it), passing by the Greek town of Stagirus, and came to Acanthus. He took along with him all these tribes and those that dwelt about the Pangaean range, just as he did those previously mentioned, the men of the coast serving in his fleet and the inland men in his land army.
7.115.3
The entire road along which king Xerxes led his army the Thracians neither break up nor sow, but they hold it in great reverence to this day.
ch. 116
7.116.1
When Xerxes came to Acanthus, he declared the Acanthians his guests and friends, and gave them Median clothing, praising them for the zeal with which he saw them furthering his campaign, and for what he heard of the digging of the canal.
ch. 117
7.117.1
While Xerxes was at Acanthus, it happened that Artachaees, overseer of the digging of the canal, died of an illness. He was high in Xerxes' favor, an Achaemenid by lineage, and the tallest man in Persia, lacking four finger-breadths of five royal cubits note in stature, and his voice was the loudest on earth. For this reason Xerxes mourned him greatly and gave him a funeral and burial of great pomp, and the whole army poured libations on his tomb.
7.117.2
The Acanthians hold Artachaees a hero, and sacrifice to him, calling upon his name. This they do at the command of an oracle.
ch. 118
7.118.1
King Xerxes, then, mourned for the death of Artachaees. But the Greeks who received Xerxes' army and entertained the king himself were brought to such a degree of misery, that they were driven from house and home. Witness the case of the Thasians, who received and feasted Xerxes' army on behalf of their towns on the mainland; Antipatrus son of Orgeus, as notable a man as any of his townsmen, chosen by them for this task, rendered them an account of four hundred silver talents expended on the dinner.
ch. 119
7.119.1
Similar accounts were returned by the officers in the other towns. Now the dinner, about which a great deal of fuss had been made and for the preparation of which orders had been given long ago, proceeded as I will tell.
7.119.2
As soon as the townsmen had word from the herald's proclamation, they divided corn among themselves in their cities and all of them for many months ground it to wheat and barley meal; moreover, they fed the finest beasts that money could buy, and kept landfowl and waterfowl in cages and ponds, for the entertaining of the army. They also made gold and silver cups and bowls and all manner of service for the table.
7.119.3
These things were provided for the king himself and those that ate with him. For the rest of the army they provided only food. At the coming of the army, there was always a tent ready for Xerxes to take his rest in, while the men camped out in the open air.
7.119.4
When the hour came for dinner, the real trouble for the hosts began. When they had eaten their fill and passed the night there, the army tore down the tent on the next day and marched off with all the movables, leaving nothing but carrying all with them.
ch. 120
