L'itinéraire des Dix-Mille en Mésopotamie et l'apport des sources cunéiformes

Abstract

Several interesting facts emerge when one places the information contained in the Anabasis side by side with that provided by the contemporary cuneiform texts on the Mid-Euphrates and northern Babylonia. The route taken by Cyrus along the left bank of the Euphrates is revealed as unconventional. The choice of this itinerary is dictrated both by the strategy he is following vis-à-vis his brother, as well as by his troops. The countryside crossed by the Ten Thousand in northern Babylonia helps to define more precisely and fully what the cuneiform sources suggest : it is primarily an agricultural region, where rural settlement at the expense of the traditional Babylonian cities was favoured under the Achaemenids. The same phenomenon can be observed in the former region of Assyria when the soldiers move up the Tigris. The accuracy of Xenophon's observations on the desert fauna and Babylonian flora needs to be stressed, despite the fact that his interpretation of various features of the landscape are somewhart contrived. This may be either his own doing or that of his characters.