Marathon messenger who ran from Athens to Sparta asking for help, and then ran back, a distance of over each way. In some Herodotus manuscripts, the name of the runner between Athens and Sparta is given as Philippides. Herodotus makes no mention of a messenger sent from Marathon to Athens, and relates that the main part of the Athenian army, having fought and won the grueling battle, and fearing a naval raid by the Persian fleet against an undefended Athens, marched quickly back from the battle to Athens, arriving the same day. In 1879, Robert Browning wrote the poem "Pheidippides". Browning's
Marathon Boy Youth" dredged up off the coast of Fano, Italy; the Riace bronzes, found in 1972; the Dancing Satyr of Mazara del Vallo, in the Sicily Channel, 2003; and the "Apoxyomenos" recovered from the sea off the Croatian island of Lošinj in 1999. Marathon Boy The Marathon Boy or Ephebe of Marathon is a Greek bronze sculpture found in the Aegean Sea in the bay of Marathon in 1925. The sculpture is conserved in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens where it is dated to around 340–330 BC. The Museum suggests that the subject is the winner of an athletic competition.