The influences behind Anabasis

AnabasisXenophon

c. 400 BCE

Anabasis

Xenophon

Late Classical Greece. Classical Greece (written in exile at Scillus/Corinth). Written in Ancient Greek.

Xenophon's Anabasis, written probably in the 370s BCE, is a first-person account (told in the third person) of the march of Cyrus the Younger's Greek mercenaries into Mesopotamia in 401 BCE and of their retreat to the Black Sea after Cunaxa. Its tree runs back through Herodotus, Thucydides and Ctesias to Homer, and through Herodotus' Persian and archaic Greek sources to Mesopotamian and Anatolian texts.

Where it came from

Odyssey, Homer c. 725 BCE follow this thread
Histories, Herodotus c. 430 BCE
Iliad, Homer c. 750 BCE
The Persians, Aeschylus 472 BCE follow this thread
Elegies (Eunomia and martial exhortations), Tyrtaeus c. 650 BCE follow this thread
Poems (fragments), Archilochus c. 650 BCE follow this thread

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c. 430 BCE

Histories

Herodotus

Classical Greece. Ionia and Athens. Written in Ancient Greek (Ionic).

Inquiry into the Persian Wars and their background, mixing campaign narrative with ethnography and geography of the Persian empire.

What it handed down

To Anabasis (c. 400 BCE)

Structural model, well documented.

Herodotus measured the Persian Royal Road in stages and parasangs (5.52–54); Xenophon structures the march of Book 1 the same way, logging each stage and parasang count. His digressions on the Carduchians, Chalybes and Mossynoeci follow Herodotus' habit of pausing the march for the customs of the peoples met.

Where it came from

Periodos Ges (Circuit of the Earth), Hecataeus of Miletus c. 500 BCE follow this thread
Iliad, Homer c. 750 BCE
Theogony, Hesiod c. 700 BCE follow this thread
The Persians, Aeschylus 472 BCE follow this thread
Plataea Elegy, Simonides of Ceos c. 478 BCE
Poems (elegies and iambics), Solon c. 590 BCE follow this thread
Odyssey, Homer c. 725 BCE follow this thread
Behistun Inscription, Darius I c. 520 BCE follow this thread

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Plataea ElegySimonides of Ceos

c. 478 BCE

Plataea Elegy

Simonides of Ceos

Late Archaic Greece. Greece. Written in Ancient Greek.

Fragmentary narrative elegy, recovered on papyrus, celebrating the Greek march to and victory at Plataea over the Persians.

What it handed down

To Histories (c. 430 BCE)

Thematic kinship, probable.

Simonides' Plataea elegy narrated the Greek march and battle within living memory, in epic style. Scholars such as Deborah Boedeker have argued that it shaped Herodotus' account of the Plataea campaign in Book 9.

Where it came from

Iliad, Homer c. 750 BCE

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c. 750 BCE

Iliad

Homer

Archaic Greece. Ionia. Written in Ancient Greek (Homeric).

Hexameter epic of the wrath of Achilles in the tenth year of the Trojan War, built on assemblies, speeches and battles.

What it handed down

To Anabasis (c. 400 BCE)

Thematic kinship, probable.

Xenophon's rise in Book 3, a sleepless night, a dream, then rousing the leaderless captains and speaking to the assembled army, is modeled on Iliadic assembly scenes and on Nestor's and Odysseus' rallying speeches. Scholars read the generals' debates and Xenophon's self-portrait as a young leader against the Iliad's councils.

To Histories (c. 430 BCE)

Structural model, well documented.

Herodotus frames the Persian Wars as a successor to the Trojan War, opening with abductions that culminate in Helen, and discusses the Iliad directly at 2.116–117. His speeches, catalogue of Xerxes' army and battle narratives follow Homeric models, which is why ancient critics called him 'most Homeric'.

To The Persians

Structural model, probable.

The play's chanted catalogues of Persian commanders and contingents imitate the Iliad's Catalogue of Ships. The messenger's battle narrative uses Homeric diction for the fighting at Salamis.

To Plataea Elegy (c. 478 BCE)

Direct source, well documented.

The Plataea elegy opens with a hymn to Achilles and compares the fallen at Plataea to the heroes of Troy. Simonides presents the recent battle as a new Iliad, with Homer's fame as the model for the Greeks' fame.

To Elegies (Eunomia and martial exhortations)

Direct source, well documented.

Tyrtaeus fragment 10 adapts Priam's speech at Iliad 22.71–76 on the shame of an old man lying dead in the front line while the young look on. His elegies are written in Homeric vocabulary recast for the hoplite phalanx.

To Poems (fragments)

Stylistic influence, well documented.

Archilochus writes in Homeric diction while overturning Homeric values: his poem on abandoning his shield to a Thracian answers the Iliadic ideal of the warrior who dies rather than flees. He calls himself 'servant of Lord Enyalios', using the Iliad's name for Ares.

To Odyssey

Structural model, well documented.

The Odyssey assumes the Iliad's story and characters and is composed in the same hexameter diction. Its nostos takes up the aftermath of the war, and Odysseus' visit to the underworld reunites him with Achilles and Ajax.

Where it came from

Epic of Gilgamesh (Standard Babylonian version), Sîn-lēqi-unninni (attributed) c. 1200 BCE

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c. 1200 BCE

Epic of Gilgamesh (Standard Babylonian version)

Sîn-lēqi-unninni (attributed)

Middle Babylonian. Mesopotamia. Written in Akkadian.

Twelve-tablet epic of the king of Uruk, his friendship with Enkidu, his journey to the ends of the earth and his failed quest for immortality.

What it handed down

To Odyssey

Disputed link, probable.

Gilgamesh's journey to the edge of the world, his meeting with the goddess Siduri and his crossing of the waters of death parallel Odysseus' stays with Circe and Calypso and his visit to the dead. The resemblances are close, but how the material reached Greece is unsettled.

To Iliad (c. 750 BCE)

Disputed link, conjectural.

Achilles' grief for Patroclus, his refusal to accept the burial and his confrontation with mortality closely resemble Gilgamesh's mourning for Enkidu. Scholars including M. L. West have argued for Near Eastern transmission, but no route of reading is documented.

Where it came from

Atrahasis, Anonymous c. 1700 BCE
Sumerian Gilgamesh poems (Gilgamesh and Huwawa, Death of Gilgamesh), Anonymous c. 2100 BCE follow this thread

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c. 1700 BCE

Atrahasis

Anonymous

Old Babylonian. Mesopotamia. Written in Akkadian.

Babylonian epic of the creation of humankind and the gods' attempt to destroy it by flood, survived by Atrahasis.

What it handed down

To Epic of Gilgamesh (Standard Babylonian version) (c. 1200 BCE)

Direct source, well documented.

The flood story Utnapishtim tells in Tablet XI is taken from Atrahasis, sometimes nearly line for line. At one point the Standard Babylonian text even calls Utnapishtim 'Atrahasis'.

Where it came from

This is one of the oldest surviving works in its tradition; the line ends here.

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Where it came from

What it handed down

To Anabasis (c. 400 BCE)

Where it came from

What it handed down

To Histories (c. 430 BCE)

Where it came from

What it handed down

To Anabasis (c. 400 BCE)

To Histories (c. 430 BCE)

To The Persians

To Plataea Elegy (c. 478 BCE)

To Elegies (Eunomia and martial exhortations)

To Poems (fragments)

To Odyssey

Where it came from

What it handed down

To Odyssey

To Iliad (c. 750 BCE)

Where it came from

What it handed down

To Epic of Gilgamesh (Standard Babylonian version) (c. 1200 BCE)

Where it came from

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