In another oration, composed about fifty years after the Cyreian expedition, Isokrates notices the large premiums which it had been formerly necessary to give to those who brought together mercenary soldiers, over and above the pay to the soldiers themselves (Isokrates, Orat. v. ad Philipp. s. 112); as contrasted with the over-multiplication of unemployed mercenaries during his own later time (Ibid. s. 142 seq.)
[204] Xen. Anab. v, 1, 3-13.
Ὁρῶ δ᾽ ἐγὼ πλοῖα πολλάκις παραπλέοντα, etc. This is a forcible proof how extensive was the Grecian commerce with the town and region of Phasis, at the eastern extremity of the Euxine.
[205] Xen. Anab v. 1, 15.
[206] Xen. Anab. v. 2.
[207] Xen. Anab. v, 3, 3. Mr. Kinneir (Travels in Asia Minor, p. 327) and many other authors, have naturally presumed from the analogy of name that the modern town Kerasoun (about long. 38° 40′) corresponds to the Kerasus of Xenophon; which Arrian in his Periplus conceives to be identical with what was afterwards called Pharnakia.
But it is remarked both by Dr. Cramer (Asia Minor, vol. i, p. 281) and by Mr. Hamilton (Travels in Asia Minor, ch. xv, p. 250), that Kerasoun is too far from Trebizond to admit of Xenophon having marched with the army from the one place to the other in three days; or even in less than ten days, in the judgment of Mr. Hamilton. Accordingly Mr. Hamilton places the site of the Kerasus of Xenophon much nearer to Trebizond (about long. 39° 20′, as it stands in Kiepert’s map of Asia Minor,) near a river now called the Kerasoun Dere Sú.
[208] It was not without great difficulty that Mr. Kinneir obtained horses to travel from Kotyôra to Kerasoun by land. The aga of the place told him that it was madness to think of travelling by land, and ordered a felucca for him; but was at last prevailed on to furnish horses. There seems, indeed, to have been no regular or trodden road at all; the hills approach close to the sea, and Mr. Kinneir “travelled the whole of the way along the shore alternately over a sandy beach and a high wooded bank. The hills at intervals jutting out into the sea, form capes and numerous little bays along the coast; but the nature of the country was still the same, that is to say, studded with fine timber, flowers, and groves of cherry trees” (Travels in Asia Minor, p. 324).
Kerasus is the indigenous country of the cherry tree, and the origin of its name.
Professor Koch thinks, that the number of days’ march given by Xenophon (ten days) between Kerasus and Kotyôra, is more than consists with the real distance, even if Kerasus be placed where Mr. Hamilton supposes. If the number be correctly stated, he supposes that the Greeks must have halted somewhere (Zug der Zehn Tausend. p. 115. 116).