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I finished Xenophon’s Anabasis, returned to Hellenica and finished it.

Ignoring Anabasis, I read Herodutos Histories, Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War and Xenophon’s Hellenica. They tell tales of the rise and fall of empires: the rise and fall of the athenian empire, the spartan hegemony in the hellenic world and the very short-lived theban hegemony (it lasted less than 10 years, from the Battle of Leuctra until the Battle of Mantinea - which is the last event narrated in Hellenica). How in one moment a state can control others both close and far away and in the next be fighting in it’s own capital for survival - or vice-versa. Fascinating stuff.

Currently, I feel like taking a break from history and reading something else, perhaps drama. I’m inclined towards Shakespeare’s MacBeth. That said, I fully intend to return to history after the interval though I’m not sure if I’ll continue reading ancient greek history or if I’ll go back to roman history or maybe an even bigger chronological jump to 19th or 20th century history.

I’ll leave you with the last paragraph of Hellenica - relating to the Battle of Mantinea (my emphasis):

The effective result of these achievements was the very opposite of that which the world at large anticipated. Here, where well-nigh the whole of Hellas was met together in one field, and the combatants stood rank against rank confronted, there was no one doubted that, in the event of battle, the conquerors would this day rule; and that those who lost would be their subjects. But God so ordered it that both belligerents alike set up trophies as claiming victory, and neither interfered with the other in the act. Both parties alike gave back their enemy’s dead under a truce, and in right of victory; both alike, in symbol of defeat, under a truce took back their dead. And though both claimed to have won the day, neither could show that he had thereby gained any accession of territory, or state, or empire, or was better situated than before the battle. Uncertainty and confusion, indeed, had gained ground, being tenfold greater throughout the length and breadth of Hellas after the battle than before.