Histories

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.

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.

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 Iran [53,32] (nation), AsiaPersia, lacking four finger-breadths of five royal cubits[*](This would make Artachaees eight feet high.) 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.