The First Four Books of Xenophon's Anabasis Part 12

[Footnote 197: ???? ?????? ???????.] See iv. 2. 11.]

[Footnote 198: ?sfa?????t? e?? t?? p?ta??.] Offering a sacrifice to the G.o.ds inhabiting the river, as Alexander in the middle of the h.e.l.lespont sacrificed a bull to Neptune and the Nereids: see Arrian i. 11. 10, cited by Hutchinson. "They slew the animals so as to allow the blood to flow into the river." _Poppo_.]

[Footnote 199: ??? p????.] The ford mentioned in sect. 5, 6.]

[Footnote 200: Behind the enemy. _Kuhner_. Or behind the cavalry that were pursuing the enemy.]

[Footnote 201: Those mentioned in sect. 3.]

[Footnote 202: ?p? f??a????.] This disposition of a company was in opposition to ????? ?????? (iv. 2. 11): see c. 8, sect, 10. The expression ?p? f??a????, says Kuhner, properly means _for a phalanx_, or _so that a phalanx_ (or _acies_) _might be formed_.]

[Footnote 203: ?????????????.] The verb d????????s?a? is rightly interpreted by Hesychius t? ??e??a? t??? da?t????? t? ?????? (h. e.

amento) t?? ????t???. _Sturz_. The following ?p?e??????? must be similarly explained.]

[Footnote 204: ?sp?? ??f?.] From the enemy's missiles striking upon it.

_Kuhner_. Hutchinson, Weiske, and Zeune think that a clas.h.i.+ng of s.h.i.+elds on the part of the Greeks is meant, preparatory to an onset; but, without doubt, erroneously.]

[Footnote 205: Or, _sound a charge_. The design of it was to precipitate the enemy's flight. Compare sect. 32.]

CHAPTER IV.

The Greeks enter Armenia, pa.s.s the sources of the Tigris, and arrive at the Teleboas. They make a treaty with Tiribazus, the governor of the province, and discover his insincerity.

1. When they had crossed, and had ranged themselves in order about noon, they proceeded through the country of Armenia, consisting wholly of plains and gently sloping hills, a distance of not less than five parasangs; for there were no villages near the river, in consequence of the hostilities with the Carduchi. 2. The village, however, at which they at length arrived, was of considerable size, and contained a palace for the satrap;[206] upon most of the houses there were towers[207], and provisions were in great plenty.

3. Hence they proceeded, two days' journey, a distance of ten parasangs, until they pa.s.sed round the sources of the river Tigris. From hence they advanced, three days' journey, fifteen parasangs, to the river Teleboas, a stream not large, indeed, but of much beauty[208]; and there were many villages on its banks. 4. This part of the country was called Western Armenia. The deputy-governor of it was Tiribazus, who was an intimate friend of the king; and no one else, when he was present, a.s.sisted the king to mount his horse. 5. He now rode up with a body of cavalry, and sending forward an interpreter, said that he wished to speak with the commanders. The generals thought proper to hear what he had to say, and, advancing within hearing, asked what he wanted. 6. He replied, that he wished to make a treaty with them, on the conditions that he himself should not hurt the Greeks, and that the Greeks should not burn the houses, but should be at liberty to take such provisions as they required. This proposal was agreeable to the generals, and they concluded a treaty upon these terms.

7. Hence they proceeded, three days' march, a distance of fifteen parasangs, through a plain; and Tiribazus followed them with his troops, keeping at the distance of about ten stadia. They then came to a palace,[209] with several villages around it stored with abundance of provisions. 8. While they were encamped, there fell a great quant.i.ty of snow[210] in the night; and in the morning it was thought advisable that the companies and officers should take up their quarters in the neighbouring villages; for they perceived no enemy, and it appeared to be safe on account of the quant.i.ty of the snow.[211] 9. Here they found all kinds of excellent provisions, cattle, corn, old wines of great fragrance, dried grapes, and vegetables of all kinds.

Some of the soldiers, however, who had strolled away from the camp, brought word that they had caught sight of an army, and that many fires had been visible during the night. 10. The generals thought it unsafe, therefore, for the troops to quarter apart, and resolved to bring the whole army together again. They accordingly a.s.sembled, for it seemed to be clearing up.[212] 11. But as they were pa.s.sing the night here, there fell a vast quant.i.ty of snow, so that it covered both the arms and the men as they lay on the ground. The snow cramped the baggage-cattle, and they were very reluctant to rise; for, as they lay, the snow that had fallen upon them served to keep them warm, when it had not dropped off.

12. But when Xenophon was hardy enough to rise without his outer garment, and to cleave wood, some one else then rose, and, taking the wood from him, cleft it himself. Soon after, the rest got up, and lighted fires and anointed themselves; 13. for abundance of ointment was found there, made of hog's-lard, sesamum,[213] bitter almonds, and turpentine, which they used instead of oil. Of the same materials also an odoriferous unguent was found.

14. After this it was resolved to quarter again throughout the villages, under shelter; and the soldiers went off with great shouting and delight to the cottages and provisions. Those who had set fire to the houses, when they quitted them before, paid the penalty of having to encamp uncomfortably in the open air. 15. Hence they despatched in the night Democrates of Temenos, giving him a detachment of men, to the hills where the stragglers said that they had seen the fires; they selected him because he was thought on several former occasions to have brought exact information concerning such matters, reporting what was, just as it appeared, and what was not, as not existing. 16. Having gone, he said that he saw no fires, but he brought with him a captive that he had taken, having a Persian bow and quiver, and a short battle-axe, such as the Amazons have. 17. Being asked of what country he was, he said that he was a Persian, and that he was going from the army of Tiribazus to get provisions. They then asked him how large the army was, and for what purpose it was a.s.sembled. 18. He said that Tiribazus had his own troops, and some mercenaries from the Chalybes and Taochians; and that he was prepared to attack the Greeks in their pa.s.sage over the mountains, at a narrow defile through which lay their only road.

19. The generals, on hearing this, resolved to collect the army, and, leaving a guard, with Sophaenetus the Stymphalian as commander over those who stayed behind, proceeded to march without delay, taking the man that had been captured for their guide. 20. After they had pa.s.sed the mountains, the peltasts, who went before the rest, and were the first to discover the enemy's camp, did not wait for the heavy-armed men, but ran forward with a shout to attack it. 21. The Barbarians, hearing the noise, did not stand their ground, but fled; some of them however were killed, and about twenty horses taken, as was also the tent of Tiribazus, and in it some couches with silver feet, and drinking-cups, and some prisoners, who said that they were bakers and cup-bearers. 22.

When the officers of the heavy-armed troops heard what had taken place, they resolved upon marching back as fast as possible to their own camp, lest any attempt should be made on those who had been left there.

Calling in the men immediately, therefore, by sound of trumpet, they returned to the camp the same day.

[Footnote 206: Orontes: iii. 5. 17; 4. 3, 4. He was the satrap, as Kruger thinks, of Eastern Armenia; Tiribazus being called satrap of Western Armenia, sect. 4.]

[Footnote 207: ???se??.] Apparently intended for a sort of defences, should the people be attacked by any of their neighbours. Compare v. 2.

5.]

[Footnote 208: ?a??? ??, ??a? d' ??.] I have, with Bornemann and Poppo, restored this reading, in which all the ma.n.u.scripts concur.

Muretus, from Demetrius Phalereus, sect. 6 and 121, has given ??a? ??

??, ?a??? d?, and Hutchinson and all other editors down to Bornemann have followed him. It cannot be denied that this is the usual order in such phrases; as in iv. 8. 2; vi. 4. 20; but pa.s.sages are not wanting in which the contrary order is observed; see iv. 6. 2. _Kuhner_. As the piece attributed to Demetrius Phalereus is not genuine, little attention need be paid to it.]

[Footnote 209: It would seem to have been the palace of Tiribazus, as the one mentioned in sect. 2 was that of Orontes. _Schneider_.]

[Footnote 210: See Diod. Sic. xiv. 28.] Ainsworth speaks of the cold in the nights on these Armenian uplands, p. 173. "When Lucullus, in his expedition against Mithridates, marched through Armenia, his army suffered as much by the frost and snow as the Greeks under Xenophon; and, when Alexander Severus returned through this country, many of his men lost their hands and feet through excessive cold. Tournefort also complains that at Erzeroum, though situated in a plain, his fingers were so benumbed with cold, that he could not write till an hour after sunrise. (See Plutarch in Lucull., and Zonaras's Annals.)" _Spelman_.]

[Footnote 211: There being no cause to apprehend the approach of an enemy during such deep snow.]

[Footnote 212: ??a??????e??.] The commentators rightly interpret this word disserenascere, "to clear up." _Kuhner_; who, however, prefers s??a??????e??, for which there is good ma.n.u.script authority. He translates it, with Bornemann, _simul disserenascere_, "to clear up at the same time;" so that the one word has little advantage over the other. Sturz disapproves of the interpretation _disserenascere_, and would have both verbs to signify _sub dio agere_, "to bivouack in the open air;" but the other sense appears preferable.]

[Footnote 213: See note on i. 2. 22. Oil made of sesamum, or sesama, is mentioned, says Kuhner, by Plin. H. N. xiii. 1, xviii. 10; Q. Curt. vii.

4. 23; Dioscorid. 2. 119-121; Theophrast. de Odoribus, p. 737, ed.

Schneid.; Salmas. Exercit. Plin. p. 727; Interp. ad Aristoph. Pac. 865.]

CHAPTER V.

The Greeks march through an uninhabited tract of country, suffering greatly from cold winds, snow, and want of provisions. At length they reach some well-stored villages, where they rest seven days.

1. The next day it was thought necessary to march away as fast as possible, before the enemy's force should be re-a.s.sembled, and get possession of the pa.s.s. Collecting their baggage at once, therefore, they set forward through a deep snow, taking with them several guides; and, having the same day pa.s.sed the height on which Tiribazus had intended to attack them, they encamped. 2. Hence they proceeded three days' journey through a desert tract of country, a distance of fifteen parasangs,[214] to the river Euphrates, and pa.s.sed it without being wet higher than the middle. The sources of the river were said not to be far off. 3. From hence they advanced three days' march, through much snow and a level plain, a distance of fifteen parasangs; the third day's march was extremely troublesome, as the north-wind blew full in their faces, completely parching up everything and benumbing the men. 4. One of the augurs, in consequence, advised that they should sacrifice to the wind; and a sacrifice was accordingly offered; when the vehemence of the wind appeared to every one manifestly to abate. The depth of the snow was a fathom;[215] so that many of the baggage-cattle and slaves perished, with about thirty of the soldiers. 5. They continued to burn fires through the whole night, for there was plenty of wood at the place of encampment. But those who came up late could get no wood; those therefore who had arrived before, and had kindled fires, would not admit the late comers to the fire unless they gave them a share of the corn or other provisions that they had brought. 6. Thus they shared with each other what they respectively had. In the places where the fires were made, as the snow melted, there were formed large pits that reached down to the ground; and here there was accordingly opportunity to measure the depth of the snow.

7. From hence they marched through snow the whole of the following day, and many of the men contracted the _bulimia_.[216] Xenophon, who commanded in the rear, finding in his way such of the men as had fallen down with it, knew not what disease it was. 8. But as one of those acquainted with it, told him that they were evidently affected with _bulimia_, and that they would get up if they had something to eat, he went round among the baggage, and, wherever he saw anything eatable, he gave it out, and sent such as were able to run to distribute it among those diseased, who, as soon as they had eaten, rose up and continued their march. 9. As they proceeded, Cheirisophus came, just as it grew dark, to a village, and found, at a spring in front of the rampart, some women and girls belonging to the place fetching water. 10. The women asked them who they were; and the interpreter answered, in the Persian language, that they were people going from the king to the satrap. They replied that he was not there, but about a parasang off. However, as it was late, they went with the water-carriers within the rampart, to the head man of the village; 11. and here Cheirisophus, and as many of the troops as could come up, encamped; but of the rest, such as were unable to get to the end of the journey, spent the night on the way without food or fire; and some of the soldiers lost their lives on that occasion. 12. Some of the enemy too, who had collected themselves into a body, pursued our rear, and seized any of the baggage-cattle that were unable to proceed, fighting with one another for the possession of them.

Such of the soldiers, also, as had lost their sight from the effects of the snow, or had had their toes mortified by the cold, were left behind.

13. It was found to be a relief to the eyes against the snow, if the soldiers kept something black before them on the march, and to the feet, if they kept constantly in motion, and allowed themselves no rest, and if they took off their shoes in the night; 14. but as to such as slept with their shoes on, the straps worked into their feet, and the soles were frozen about them; for when their old shoes had failed them, shoes of raw hides had been made by the men themselves from the newly-skinned oxen. 15. From such unavoidable sufferings, some of the soldiers were left behind, who, seeing a piece of ground of a black appearance, from the snow having disappeared there, conjectured that it must have melted; and it had in fact melted in the spot from the effect of a fountain, which was sending up vapour in a woody hollow close at hand. Turning aside thither, they sat down and refused to proceed farther. 16.

Xenophon, who was with the rear-guard, as soon as he heard this, tried to prevail on them by every art and means not to be left behind, telling them, at the same time, that the enemy were collected, and pursuing them in great numbers. At last he grew angry; and they told him to kill them, as they were quite unable to go forward. 17. He then thought it the best course to strike a terror, if possible, into the enemy that were behind, lest they should fall upon the exhausted soldiers. It was now dark, and the enemy were advancing with a great noise, quarrelling about the booty that they had taken; 18. when such of the rear-guard as were not disabled, started up, and rushed towards them, while the tired men, shouting as loud as they could, clashed their spears against their s.h.i.+elds. The enemy, struck with alarm, threw themselves among the snow into the hollow, and no one of them afterwards made themselves heard from any quarter.

19. Xenophon, and those with him, telling the sick men that a party should come to their relief next day, proceeded on their march, but before they had gone four stadia, they found other soldiers resting by the way in the snow, and covered up with it, no guard being stationed over them. They roused them up, but they said that the head of the army was not moving forward. 20. Xenophon, going past them, and sending on some of the ablest of the peltasts, ordered them to ascertain what it was that hindered their progress. They brought word that the whole army was in that manner taking rest. 21. Xenophon and his men, therefore, stationing such a guard as they could, took up their quarters there without fire or supper. When it was near day, he sent the youngest of his men to the sick, telling them to rouse them and oblige them to proceed. 22. At this juncture Cheirisophus sent some of his people from the villages to see how the rear were faring. The young men were rejoiced to see them, and gave them the sick to conduct to the camp, while they themselves went forward, and, before they had gone twenty stadia, found themselves at the village in which Cheirisophus was quartered. 23. When they came together, it was thought safe enough to lodge the troops up and down in the villages. Cheirisophus accordingly remained where he was, and the other officers, appropriating by lot the several villages that they had in sight, went to their respective quarters with their men.

24. Here Polycrates, an Athenian captain, requested leave of absence, and, taking with him the most active of his men, and hastening to the village which Xenophon had been allotted, surprised all the villagers, and their head man, in their houses, together with seventeen[217] colts that were bred as a tribute for the king, and the head man's daughter, who had been but nine days married; her husband was gone out to hunt hares, and was not found in any of the villages. 25. Their houses were under ground, the entrance like the mouth of a well, but s.p.a.cious below; there were pa.s.sages dug into them for the cattle, but the people descended by ladders. In the houses were goats, sheep, cows, and fowls, with their young; all the cattle were kept on fodder within the walls.[218] 26. There was also wheat, barley, leguminous vegetables, and barley-wine,[219] in large bowls; the grains of barley floated in it even with the brims of the vessels, and reeds also lay in it, some larger and some smaller, without joints; 27. and these, when any one was thirsty, he was to take in his mouth, and suck.[220] The liquor was very strong, unless one mixed water with it, and a very pleasant drink to those accustomed to it.

28. Xenophon made the chief man of his village sup with him, and told him to be of good courage, a.s.suring him that he should not be deprived of his children, and that they would not go away without filling his house with provisions in return for what they took, if he would but prove himself the author of some service to the army till they should reach another tribe. 29. This he promised, and, to show his good-will, pointed out where some wine[221] was buried. This night, therefore, the soldiers rested in their several quarters in the midst of great abundance, setting a guard over the chief, and keeping his children at the same time under their eye. 30. The following day Xenophon took the head man and went with him to Cheirisophus, and wherever he pa.s.sed by a village, he turned aside to visit those who were quartered in it, and found them in all parts feasting and enjoying themselves; nor would they anywhere let them go till they had set refreshments before them; 31. and they placed everywhere upon the same table lamb, kid, pork, veal, and fowl, with plenty of bread both of wheat and barley. 32. Whenever any person, to pay a compliment, wished to drink to another, he took him to the large bowl, where he had to stoop down and drink, sucking like an ox. The chief they allowed to take whatever he pleased, but he accepted nothing from them; where he found any of his relatives, however, he took them with him.

33. When they came to Cheirisophus, they found his men also feasting in their quarters,[222] crowned with wreaths made of hay, and Armenian boys, in their Barbarian dresses, waiting upon them, to whom they made signs what they were to do as if they had been deaf and dumb. 34. When Cheirisophus and Xenophon had saluted one another, they both asked the chief man, through the interpreter who spoke the Persian language, what country it was. He replied that it was Armenia. They then asked him for whom the horses were bred; and he said that they were a tribute for the king, and added that the neighbouring country was that of the Chalybes, and told them in what direction the road lay. 35. Xenophon then went away, conducting the chief back to his family, giving him the horse that he had taken, which was rather old, to fatten and offer in sacrifice, (for he had heard that it had been consecrated to the sun,) being afraid, indeed, that it might die, as it had been injured by the journey. He then took some of the young horses, and gave one of them to each of the other generals and captains. 36. The horses in this country were smaller than those of Persia, but far more spirited. The chief instructed the men to tie little bags round the feet of the horses, and other cattle, when they drove them through the snow, for without such bags they sunk up to their bellies.

[Footnote 214: Rennell, p. 214, and Kinneir, p. 485, think this distance too great for troops marching through deep snow. ???te occurs in one ma.n.u.script, and Kuhner has admitted it into his text.]

[Footnote 215: ??????.] A great depth. We cannot suppose the snow to have been of that depth everywhere. None of the commentators make any remark.]

[Footnote 216: ??????asa?.] Spelman quotes a description of the ?????a or ?????? from Galen Med. Def., in which it is said to be "a disease in which the patient frequently craves for food, loses the use of his limbs, falls down, turns pale, feels his extremities become cold, his stomach oppressed, and his pulse feeble." Here, however, it seems to mean little more than a faintness from long fasting.]

[Footnote 217: That this number is corrupt is justly suspected by Weiske, and shown at some length by Kruger de Authent. p. 47. Bornemann, in his preface, p. xxiv., proposes ?pt? ?a? ??at??, a hundred and seven.

Strabo, xi. 14, says that the satrap of Armenia used to send annually to the king of Persia twenty thousand horses. _Kuhner_. Kruger, 1. c., suggests that Xenophon may have written S' _two hundred_, instead, of ??', _seventeen_. In sect. 35 we find Xenophon taking some of these horses himself, and giving one to each of the other generals and captains; so that the number must have been considerable.]

[Footnote 218: "This description of a village on the Armenian uplands applies itself to many that I visited in the present day. The descent by wells is now rare, but is still to be met with; but in exposed and elevated situations, the houses are uniformly semi-subterraneous, and entered by as small an aperture as possible, to prevent the cold getting in. Whatever is the kind of cottage used, cows, sheep, goats, and fowls partic.i.p.ate with the family in the warmth and protection thereof."

_Ainsw. Travels_, p. 178.]