Xenophon was the son of Gryllos, an Athenian who owned land in Erchia in the east of Attica. The year of his birth is not known, nor is there reliable information on when, or where, he died. For the more than seventy years that he may have lived there are few solid biographical details, and most of these derive from his own works. Yet if the facts of his own life are sparsely documented, knowledge of Classical Athenian life is comparatively rich, and by drawing on the political and social history of the city in the late fifth century we can garner a sense of the world in which he grew up and which defined who he was and became. Following a short biography, I examine three factors from the earlier years which I suggest were major influences on his life and underpin the strong apologetic Tendenz in his writings. The content and analysis of this chapter and the following one on Anabasis furnish background for the arguments in the rest of the monograph.

Biography

Sources

Xenophon was the author of fourteen complete works, a number of which supply detail about his life. In some cases the detail seems clearly autobiographical, while in others reasonable arguments can be made that he is referring to personal experience. The most prominent of these is Anabasis, his account of Cyrus the Younger's march upcountry in 401 and the subsequent retreat of his Greek mercenaries. The story provides us with a timeline for the author's movements in the period of the march and, by way of a flashforward, a window into his later life in the Peloponnese. However, there is a need for care in interpreting what he tells us about himself in his works, especially in the case of Anabasis. While many regard it as the most important source for his life, I argue in this study that the Xenophon we see in the text is an exemplary figure, a young Athenian and pupil of Socrates who applies the lessons of his teacher to the extreme situation in which he has found himself.