Xenophon wrote the Anabasis, the story of ten thousand Greek soldiers walking home from a failed war in Persia. This is Book 7, the last. In Book 6 they reached the Black Sea, nearly came apart in Bithynia in northwest Turkey, and found the door shut at Byzantium on the Bosporus.

Byzantium still will not let them in. Anaxibius, a Spartan admiral, cheats them of pay. Xenophon almost lets the army sack the city and stops the rush in the street. Seuthes, a Thracian prince, hires them with promises of cattle and forts, then pays almost nothing. They winter above the Propontis, the Sea of Marmara: snow, barley beer, and accusations. Xenophon is charged with enriching himself and opens his purse to show the holes. Thibron of Sparta needs soldiers against Tissaphernes, the Persian governor who had the original generals killed. Xenophon hands the remnant over in Asia Minor and goes on, not yet home, to another campaign.