Broadly, the Histories records the events of Persia’s invasion of, and eventual defeat by, Greece. More specifically, it tells the tale of nations and the men who ruled them to explain the channels that power and influence took in the ancient world. Much of the work follows the rise of the Persian Empire, relaying the geographic and sociocultural circumstances that permitted the rise of a massive empire. Herodotus focuses on the four kings who ruled before and during the Greco-Persian conflict and retells the story of their rise to power, rulership, and expansion tactics to indicate the governmental shift toward conquest leading into the early days of the fifth century. In so doing, he reveals how such men consolidated power for themselves and their nations. The work follows the exploits of Cyrus II, the founder of the Persian Empire; the expansionism of Cambyses II, who conquered Egypt; the ascension of the illegitimate but ultimately wildly successful Darius; and the rise and fall of his son, Xerxes. The stories of these men intersect with the lives of many across North Africa, Greece, and Western Asia, and Herodotus’s explanation of their doings and eventual defeat leaves readers with a sense of the cyclical nature of empire and expansionism, from its foundation to its climax and its ultimate decline.

Though his literary efforts were novel and largely unprecedented, Herodotus's style was indebted to his literary predecessors; he wrote in the fashion of Grecian writers and followed the tradition of epic poets like Homer and philosophers such as the Sophists. The Histories melds styles and intentions to paint an authentic image of the world as it was through the not-quite impartial eyes of its authors. As such, the work is a product of its time. The Histories is littered with literary allusions, fantastic elements, and mythology and often lacks geographical or sociological context on the author’s misplaced assumption that his readership would be limited to the people of fifth-century BCE Greece. Moreover, Herodotus wrote in a distinctly Homeric tradition, granting history a storyteller’s sense of fluidity, composed as something more akin to a narrative than a perfectly factual account of events as they were. Though Herodotus was often partial to dramatization and plot building, his work also bears the mark of Greek thinkers and teachers. His efforts to record the history of his world spoke to the widening influence of the Sophists, an educational movement intending to mold young Greek men into informed citizens. 

In this sense, the Histories is not, in fact, a true history. It is a compendium of the knowledge, experience, and world view of fifth-century BCE Greek writer and thinker motivated by a desire to understand his sociocultural circumstances. Despite its inaccuracies, off-topic dalliances, and frequent usage of gossip and hearsay, Herodotus’s masterwork is an invaluable piece of literature, useful as both a record of the Greco-Persian War and its surrounding context as well as an indicator of the humble origins of history telling.

In his introduction to the Histories, Herodotus writes that he wishes to memorialize the noteworthy deeds of the past, those of both Greek heroes and valiant barbarians—meaning non-Greeks. In so doing, he introduces a pressing theme interwoven throughout his narration of fifth-century wartime and its antecedents: the universal qualities of human existence across time and space. People behave in similar ways, he suggests, and have similar ambitions and foibles whether they are Greek or hail from what Herodotus and his fellow Greeks considered barbarian backwaters. Motivated by his desire to record the circumstances that molded his world, Herodotus’s early understanding of history was a tool for decoding the present and preparing for the future. His Histories tell a tale of monarchs and nations, of misplaced ambitions and unexpected victories, and of men, both everyday and larger than life, who made choices with earth-shattering ramifications. Histories is something of an epic, in that its retelling of events carries a didactic undercurrent that informs readers of the missteps of the past to discourage their repetition.