Thus the whole story, as it appears in the Aristotelian _Constitution of Athens_, has been accounted for. In this, as in the account of Peisistratus’ second exile, the author of the treatise seems to be following a better authority than Herodotus. Herodotus’ deviations appear to be attempts at rationalistic explanation in the best Herodotean style. From Herodotus’ account of Peisistratus’ second exile it is plain that he knew nothing of the tyrant’s connexions with Thrace, of which we are informed in the Aristotelian treatise. According to Herodotus the whole period of the second exile was spent in Euboea. Hence the Thracian reference had to be rationalized away. But a fact mentioned by Herodotus in another connexion[313] points to Hippias having maintained some sort of position in the North Aegean till the end of his reign. When in 510 B.C. he was banished, a home was offered him by the king of Macedon. Thrace and Paionia might be used indifferently in the original account, the latter being the more accurate name, the former the more popular. Herodotus takes Paionian as a corruption of Paianian, and Thracian as a popular version of Paionian. That Herodotus himself was personally responsible for the emendation Paianian is made probable by the words of the _Constitution of Athens_, “as Herodotus says, a Paianian, as some say, a Thracian.” The Paionians are made by Herodotus[314] to recognize their own name in the paian or war-cry of their enemies. Only the verb appears in the anecdote, and that in the form παιωνίζω, but Herodotus must have been equally familiar with the forms in -α-, παιανίζω, παιάν, and the anecdote shows how ready he would be to equate Paionian with Paianian. I am dealing here with pure speculation, but so too has been every one else who has tried to explain away this “extraordinarily silly business[315].” The explanation just offered is at least in harmony with the rest of our knowledge about both Peisistratus and Thrace. Greeks were certainly capable of misunderstanding a _jeu de mot_ based on a coin type. Mention has been made already of Aristophanes’ invocation of the “owls of Laurium” to nest in his purse[316]. A Scholiast on the _Knights_ has turned these owls of silver into real birds. “The owl,” he says, “is the sacred bird of Athena, that haunts Laurium in Attica[317].” [Sidenote: The tyrant Histiaeus and the Thracian mines.]