Battle of Cunaxa
Videos
The Battle of Cunaxa was fought in the late summer of 401 BC between the Persian king Artaxerxes II and his brother Cyrus the Younger for control of the Achaemenid throne. The great battle of the revo
Retreat of the Ten Thousand, at the Battle of Cunaxa, by Jean Adrien Guignet
Portrait of Artaxerxes II.
Army of Artaxerxes II, as depicted on his tomb at Persepolis.
19th Century English School depiction of the Battle of Cunaxa
Ten Thousand
Videos
The Ten Thousand were a force of mercenary units, mainly Greeks, employed by Cyrus the Younger to attempt to wrest the throne of the Persian Empire from his brother, Artaxerxes II. Their march to the
Battle of Cunaxa
…to march northwards to the Black Sea through Corduene and Armenia, to reach the Greek colonies on the shore. Their eventual success, the march of the Ten Thousand, was recorded by Xenophon in his Anabasis. Another famous writer of Antiquity, besides Xenophon, was present at the Battle of Cunaxa. Ctesias, a native…
Route of Xenophon and the Ten Thousand (red line) in the Achaemenid Empire. The satrapy of Cyrus the Younger is delineated in green.
Xenophon's Anabasis
Xenophon and the Ten Thousand hail the sea, 19th-century illustration