“A team of astronomer gumshoes has pinned down the date of an ancient Greek battle at Marathon that led to a long-distance run and the sport that survives today in its honor. Analysis of lunar records show the 490 B.C. battle occurred not on the long accepted date of September 12, but a full month earlier, researchers said….According [to]the Greek historian Herodotus, Plutarch and others, after the Greek army routed their Persian attackers at Marathon the long-distance runner Pheidippides sprinted the 26 miles (46 kilometers) back to Athens to announce the victory and warn of an attack from the sea, He then collapsed and died. Having the run occur in August ‘makes it a little more plausible that he keeled over and died,’ said physics lecturer Russell Doescher, who worked on the study with team leader Donald Olson and colleague Marilynn Olson at Texas State University at San Marcos.”