Greek Texts & Translations

5.5.13In reply to these words Xenophon, on behalf of the soldiers, rose and said: “For ourselves, men of Sinope, we have come back well content to have saved our bodies and our arms; for it was not possible at one and the same time to gather plunder and to fight with the enemy. 5.5.14As to our doings now, since we have reached Greek cities, we got our provisions in Trapezus by purchase, for the Trapezuntians provided us a market, and in return for the honours they bestowed upon us and the gifts of hospitality they gave the army, we paid them like honours; if any of the barbarians were their friends, we kept our hands off them, while upon their enemies, against whom they would themselves lead us, we wrought all the harm we could. 5.5.15Ask 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. 5.5.16On 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. 5.5.17The 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. 5.5.18The 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.

5.5.19“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. 5.5.20In 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. 5.5.21The 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.

5.5.22“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— 5.5.23and 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.”

5.5.24Hereupon 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.” 5.5.25After 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.

ch. 6 5.6.1Such 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.