The Reliability of the Anabasis

[pezhetairoi]

While we cannot doubt the veracity of the tactics used in the Retreat of the Ten Thousand, I have read, in the introduction to the Penguin edition of Anabasis (written by someone whose name I forget), among other places, that the actual role played by Xenophon in all this has been overstated, that he wrote this in reaction to another piece written by another fellow Greek Retreater (don't have the book here in the office, will fill in his name when I get home), in which he did not figure very much at all.

There have been sources, as I understand, further suggesting the possibility Anabasis was an Apology written by Xenophon to glorify himself, namely the Oxyrhynchus Historian/fragments. Reading about this has pretty much shaken my world since I had grown accustomed to thinking of Xenophon as this heroic genius who pretty much was the most creative general before Alexandros, as well as possibly part of his inspiration.

What's the current academic consensus on this? Did Xenophon really do all that, or was that really actually Cheirisophos, or the ghost of Kleandros, or is the jury still out?

[Timoleon]

I think we will never really know for sure, since many alternative (to Xenophon's) sources have been lost, but I believe that Xenophon's role in the Retreat was gradually becoming more important from Cunaxa until Thrace. Maybe he overstate a bit of his own achievements, but not too much.

Xenophon was highly esteemed by the Spartans, under whom he served after the Retreat. They gave him land and honored him by allowing his sons to undergo the Spartan Agoge (they actually died in Mantineia, 362 BC, fighting alongside the Spartan King). My personal opinion is that he can't have overstated too much, minimizing the role of the Spartan Cheirisophos and the other generals, simply because the Spartans wouldn't aproove it. After all, a great proportion of the 10.000 were Spartans or Peloponnesian allies of Sparta, so they must have known the real facts.