A decisive victory that cost everything: Why the Battle of Cunaxa changed history
In 401 BC, Cyrus the Younger challenged his brother, Artaxerxes II, for the Persian throne. Backed by thousands of elite Greek mercenaries, Cyrus seemed poised to win. Yet, despite his troops crushing the opposition, Cyrus fell in combat, turning a tactical triumph into a desperate, legendary retreat across hostile territory.
Fought 70 km north of Babylon in late summer 401 BC, the Battle of Cunaxa pitted the Achaemenid King Artaxerxes II against his brother, Cyrus the Younger. Cyrus had assembled a formidable force, including 10,400 hoplites and 2,500 light infantry led by the Spartan general Clearchus. Artaxerxes commanded a significantly larger army, estimated at 40,000 men, and utilized his superior numbers to create a line that overlapped his brother's forces.
The engagement highlighted a critical breakdown in command. Cyrus ordered Clearchus to shift his phalanx toward the center to target the King directly, but the Spartan refused, fearing his exposed right flank. While the Greek mercenaries successfully routed the Persian left wing with minimal casualties, the center of the battlefield proved fatal for the rebellion. Cyrus personally led an assault on his brother’s royal guard and was struck down by a javelin thrown by a man named Mithridates. This single moment rendered the Greek success irrelevant, as their employer was dead and their cause collapsed.
The aftermath left the Greeks stranded deep within the Persian Empire without supplies or allies. After failed negotiations with the satrap Tissaphernes—which resulted in the treacherous capture and execution of their senior officers—the remaining soldiers began the arduous march to the Black Sea. This journey, famously recorded by the participant Xenophon in his Anabasis, remains one of the most remarkable feats of military survival in antiquity. The battle also drew the attention of Ctesias, a physician in the royal court who treated Artaxerxes’ wounds and later documented the history of the conflict in his work, Persica.
Source: Battle of Cunaxa
