Anabasis

The prisoners said that the region to the south lay on the road towards Babylon and Media, the identical province they had just passed through; that the road to the eastward led to Susa and Ecbatana, where the King is said to spend his summers; across the river and on to the west was the way to Lydia and Ionia; while the route through the mountains and northward led to the country of the Carduchians.

These Carduchians, they said, dwelt up among the mountains, were a warlike people, and were not subjects of the King; in fact, a royal army of one hundred and twenty thousand men had once invaded them, and, by reason of the ruggedness of the country, not a man of all that number came back. Still, whenever they made a treaty with the satrap in the plain, some of the people of the plain did have dealings with the Carduchians and some of the Carduchians with them.

After listening to these statements from the men who claimed to know the way in every direction, the generals caused them to withdraw, without giving them the least clue as to the direction in which they proposed to march. The opinion of the generals however, was that they must make their way through the mountains into the country of the Carduchians; for the prisoners said that after passing through this country they would come to Armenia, the large and prosperous province of which Orontas was ruler; and from there, they said, it was easy to go in any direction one chose.

Thereupon the generals offered sacrifice, so that they could begin the march at the moment they thought best[*](As a rule it was immediately before an army set out that sacrifice was offered.)—for they feared that the pass over the mountains might be occupied in advance; and they issued orders that when the troops had dined, every man should pack up his belongings and go to rest, and then fall into line as soon as the word of command was given.

[*](The MSS. here prefix the following summary of the preceding narrative.)[The preceding narrative has described all that took place on the upward march until the time of the battle, all that happened after the battle during the truce concluded by the King and the Greeks who had made the upward march in company with Cyrus, and likewise the whole course of the warfare carried on against the Greeks after the King and Tissaphernes had broken the truce, when the Persian army was hanging upon the Greek rear.

When the Greeks finally reached a point where the Tigris river was quite impassable by reason of its depth and width, and where there was no passage-way alongside the river, since the Carduchian mountains hung sheer and close above it, the generals were forced to the conclusion that they must make their way through the mountains.

For they heard from the prisoners who were taken that once they had passed through the Carduchian mountains and reached Armenia, they could there cross the headwaters of the Tigris river, if they so desired, or, if they preferred, could go round them. They were also informed that the headwaters of the Euphrates were not far from those of the Tigris,—and such is indeed the case.

Now they conducted their invasion of the country of the Carduchians in the following way, since they were seeking not only to escape observation, but at the same time to reach the heights before the enemy could take possession of them.]