Spurius Cassius Vecellinus and Proculus Verginius Tricostus Rutilus, are believed to have discharged their duties as consuls the same year as the Battle of Salamis in Grece -- 480 BC.
Diodorus Siculus (XI, I, 2) stated that their praetorship coincided with the archonship of Calliades in Athens. Calliades was archon there in 480 BC, according to modern historians (Bickerman, 1980: 138). Herodotus (VII. 37, 166 and 206, also VIII. 51) confirms the possibility that the battles of Thermopylae and Salamis were fought shortly after the Olympic Games of that year, and only a few months after these events: "On approach of spring, the sun suddenly quitted his seat in the heavens, and disappeared" when Xerxes I left Sardis in Lydia, a few weeks or months before his crossing over to Greece. This total solar eclipse occurred on February 17, 478 BC, providing a valuable chronological reference.
