Halt of thirty
days, and
its secret
object.
Advance to
Peltæ, and
thence to
Ceramomm
Agora.
Cyrus rounds
a portion of
the Taurus,
and gains the
plain of
Caystrus.
spent thirty days by a halt, which is the more unaccountable,
as the army had remained a week at the previous station. The
energetic character of the prince forbids the belief, that the
temptations of the chase could have been allowed to interfere
with his ambitious project; and as the reinforcements from
Greece could have joined more easily at either of the two
halting-places to which he proceeded, delay on this account was
unnecessary. Reasons, however, may be found in the deceptive
policy of Cyrus towards his brother, and in his desire to keep
his troops in ignorance of his designs. The concentration of
his army and the halt itself, being for the time in accordance
with the supposed purpose of extirpating the Pisidians.
An additional force of Asiatics, with the levies brought from
Thrace and the rest of Greece, under Clearchus, having been
reviewed in the park, and a census taken, the troops in two
days performed a march of ten parasangs to Peltae, a well-
inhabited city; which, being the last on the road to Mysia,
probably was a little way westward of Ishekli, or Eumenia,1
and about twenty-five geographical miles from Dine'ir, the
distance according to the parasangs, at 2 • 6 miles, being only
twenty-six geographical miles. After halting three days,to
celebrate the Lupercalian sacrifice, Cyrus advanced twelve
parasangs to Ceramorura Agora (the market of the Cramians),
whose site, according to the hack distances from Koniyeh, would
be a little east of ’Ushak, and about thirty-one geographical
miles from Ishekli, the parasangs giving but 31 • 2 geographical
miles. Having by these two almost retrograde marches8 advanced
sufliciently far to the N.N.W. to round a difficult
portion of the Taurus, he resumed the easterly direction, and in
three marches or thirty parasangs,3 having passed through the
great mountain barrier, probably near the present town of
Afiyum Kara-hisar, he reached the city called the plain of
Caystrus ;4 the position of which may have been about Chai
Keui, near Eber Gol, and seventy-four geographical miles from
’Ushak, the parasangs giving seventy-eight geographical miles.
1 W. J . Hamilton’s Researches in Asia Minor, &c., vol. I I ., p. 203.
2 See Index Map. 3 Anabasis, lib. I., cap. ii.
4 Or a city on the Plain of Caystrus. Anabasis, lib. I., cap. ii.
The difficulties regarding the positions of this and the two The ancient
preceding sites have been removed by researches recently made p a re d ^ th™ "
in the country by Mr. W. J. Hamilton, and also Mr. William
Ainsworth, during the Euphrates Expedition,'and in his Travels
in the Track of the Ten Thousand Greeks.1 The former, from
a mean of the two marches eastward, viz., from Sardis to
Colossee, and from Iconium to Dana (Tyana), concludes the
value of the parasang to be about 2-455 geographical miles.2
The modern farsang, or farsakh, of Persia, varies according the farsakh of
to the nature of the ground, from three and a half, to four Per6,a-
English miles per hour; and being almost always calculated for
mules, or good horses, under favourable circumstances it frequently
exceeds four miles. The ancient parasang appears to
have been fixed at thirty stadia,3 which at 202 • 84 yards would
give three geographical miles. But this being also a road
measure, it no doubt varied as at present, and was regulated
according to the nature of the country; and fortunately we
have the means of ascertaining this difference with considerable
precision. A line, drawn along the map so as to touch the Distance from
river, at short distances, from Thapsacus to the river Araxes, is Thapsacus
about one hundred and five miles, which, for the fifty parasangs es,1Iuated>
of Xenophon, give 2-10 geographical miles each. By the
route followed from Sardis to Thapsacus, it is eight hundred and
fifty-three geographical miles, which will give 2 * 608 geographical
miles for each of the three hundred and twenty-seven
parasangs. Again, from Thapsacus to the mounds of Muham-
med, thirty-six miles from Babylon, where, for the sake of
water, the route constantly follows, and almost touches the river
Euphrates, it is four hundred and twelve geographical miles, and thence to
thus giving 1 ‘98 geographical miles for each of the two hundred Cu“axa-
and eight parasangs, or 2 * 294 geographical miles for the mean
of both. This scarcely differs from the result obtained by the
laborious and discriminating geographer Major Rennell, who,
without our present advantages, estimated the parasang at
2 • 25 miles; which, in fact, approaches an average of the
1 Parker, London, 1844.
2 W. J . Hamilton’s Researches, &c., vol. I I ., pp. 199, 200.
3 Herod., lib. I I ., cap. v i.; lib. V., cap. liii.; lib. V I., cap. xlii.