Anabasis

Ask them what sort of people they found us to be; for the men are here present whom the city of Trapezus, out of friendship, sent with us as guides.

On the other hand, wherever we come, whether it be to a barbarian or to a Greek land, and have no market at which to buy, we take provisions, not out of wantonness, but from necessity.

The Carduchians, for example, and the Taochians and Chaldaeans were not subjects of the King and were exceedingly formidable, yet, even so, we made enemies of them because of this necessity of taking provisions, inasmuch as they would not provide a market.

The Macronians, however, provided us as good a market as they could, and we therefore regarded them as friends, barbarians though they were, and took by force not a thing that belonged to them.

As for the Cotyorites, whom you claim as yours, if we have taken anything that belonged to them, they are themselves to blame; for they did not behave toward us as friends, but shut their gates and would neither admit us within nor send a market without; and they alleged that the governor set over them by you was responsible for this conduct.

In regard to your statement about people making their way into the city by force and being quartered there, we asked them to receive our sick into their houses; but when they refused to open their gates, we went in at a point where the place of itself received us; and we have done no deed of force save only that our sick are quartered in the houses, paying their own expenses, and that we are guarding the gates, in order that our sick may not be in the power of your governor, but that it may be in our power to get them back when we so wish.

The rest of us, as you see, are quartered in the open in our regular formation, all ready, in case one does us a kindness, to return the like, or if it is an injury, to return that.

As to the threat you uttered, that if you thought best you would enlist Corylas and the Paphlagonians as allies against us, we on our side are quite ready to make war with you both if it be necessary; for we have made war ere now with others who were many times your numbers. But if we think best to make a friend of the Paphlagonian—

and we hear that he has a desire for your city and strongholds on the coast—we shall try to prove ourselves his friends by aiding him to accomplish his desires.

Hereupon Hecatonymus’ fellow-ambassadors made it very clear that they were angry with him for the words he had spoken, and one of them took the floor and said that they had not come to make war, but to show that they were friends. And if you come, he continued, to the city of the Sinopeans, we shall receive you there with gifts of hospitality, and now we shall direct the people of this city to give you what they can; for we see that all you say is true.

After this the Cotyorites sent gifts of hospitality, and the generals of the Greeks entertained the ambassadors of the Sinopeans, and they had a great deal of friendly conversation with one another on general matters, while in particular they made such inquiries as each party wished in regard to the rest of the journey.

Such was the end of that day. On the next the generals called an assembly of the soldiers, and they decided to invite the Sinopeans to join them in deliberating about the rest of their journey. For if they should have to proceed by land, it seemed that the Sinopeans would be useful to them, by virtue of their acquaintance with Paphlagonia; and if they were to go by sea, there was still need, they thought, of the Sinopeans, inasmuch as they were the only people who could provide ships enough for the army.

They accordingly invited the ambassadors in and proceeded to take counsel with them, asking them, as Greeks dealing with Greeks, to make a beginning of their kindly reception by showing friendliness and offering the best advice.

Then Hecatonymus rose and, in the first place, defended himself in the matter of his remark that they would make a friend of the Paphlagonian, by saying that he did not mean that his own people would make war upon the Greeks, but rather that despite the opportunity they had to be friends of the barbarians they would choose the Greeks instead. But when they told him to proceed to give some advice, he began with a prayer to the gods as follows: