Aesop was born in Phrygia in 625 BC by slave parents and sold, according to Herodotus, to Iadmon of Samos, with whom he traveled to many places, seeing wild animals from up close. He was intelligent and had the talent of storytelling, which is why Herodotus calls him a fabulist. After being given his freedom, he became an adviser to King Croesus, who sent him on numerous missions. On one of these, in Delphi, Aesop lambasted the priests of the Oracle, saying that they were fooling the devout with tricks in order to take their money. The priests, angry, put a sacred vessel in his luggage and accused him of sacrilege in order to punish him. He was thus sentenced to death and thrown off a summit of Parnassos. Apollo, however, punished the injustice against Aesop by sending a famine to the inhabitants.