The Ten Thousand

by Michael Curtis Ford

First published 2001

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4.2(220)

In 401 BCE, Xenophon joins the Greek mercenary army hired by Cyrus the Younger, a Persian prince preparing to overthrow his brother Artaxerxes II. The expedition advances deep into Mesopotamia and wins its immediate battlefield contest at Cunaxa, but Cyrus is killed and the Greeks are left far inside hostile territory without the patron who employed them.

After Persian officials seize and execute the senior commanders, Xenophon helps organise the survivors for the long retreat north towards the Black Sea. The novel follows the Ten Thousand through hunger, mountain warfare, political division and repeated negotiation, turning a failed dynastic campaign into a story of military leadership, endurance and the struggle to bring an army home.