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Another aspect of the Herodotean imitation is the assumption of his “historiographical” persona, that is, of a gatherer and critic of information. The narrator travels in the interests of research (§9); elicits evidence by questioning (§11); records and evaluates variants (§§11–16; §28); prefers eye-witness (§48) and personal testimony, one aspect of which is the frequent use of the topos of “of all those whom/which I know” (§§2, 10, 49); suggests alternative motivations (§27); and falls silent over cultic secrets (§28). Nor is the imitation of Herodotus played straight: the text seems to inhabit a territory somewhere between pastiche (being a close imitation of the Herodotean idiolect) and parody. Although it does not seem to want to mock its subject-matter, it does – though with varying degrees of intensity – guy the narrative voice, which is intrusive, fussy, and credulous. Tall stories are told in a deadpan voice (e.g. §§36–37, the oracle of Apollo which not only moves of its own volition, but which was also seen to rise spontaneously into the air; §48, the sacred cock) or supplied with naïve commentary (§29, the scorpion which keeps the phallobates awake – or is it the fear of falling?; §46, a floating altar, like Herodotus’s Chemmis – or is it supported by a pillar?). Her doves and sacred fish are staples of the ethnography of the Syrian Goddess and of the Holy City; only Lucian, however, represents the fish as individually named and responding to summons (§45).