The Legacy of Xenophon’s Anabasis: Six studies

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to demonstrate eloquently the significance of Xenophon’s Anabasis for the Classical literature by discussing six varied topics which arouse from it. This work initiated the genre of war memoirs and at the same time, with its multifaceted context, raised several issues related chiefly with military, and to a certain decree, political, life. Simultaneously, provided to its author an opportunity to contemplate on meaningful topics, such as: i. the leadership, ii. panhellenism, and iii. religion. These topics will be discussed in the chapters 2-4. In chapter five I will present a reconstruction, based on Xenophon’s text, of the battle at Cunaxa (401 BCE), the only pitched battle of the work, which was a turning point for the army of the Greek mercenaries, who supported the prince Cyrus the Younger, in his attempt to surpass the Persian throne from his brother Artaxerxes II. The inclusion of this chapter in this thesis is important since the outcome of it begot life-changing results for Xenophon himself. The last chapter will be a deliberation on a war memoir from the contemporary history of Hellas: the memoir of Theothoros Kolokotronês (Θεόδωρος Κολοκοτρώνης), a hero of the Greek war of independence of 1821. I will display the analogies between these two memoirs, despite the gap of almost 2,200 years in between them. In this chapter, additionally, I will briefly, demonstrate the influence the Anabasis exerted on modern memoirs from the two Great Wars and the War in Vietnam by highlighting, once again, the similarities which can be identified when we read them side by side. There will also be an introduction which will include a discussion on the particular genre of war memoirs, Xenophon’s life (highly hypothetical), and the commentaries on Xenophon’s Anabasis. A summarizing conclusion will find its place at the end of this thesis.