6. The hoplite spear in the fifth century was about seven to eight feet long. In the fourth Iphicrates, with experience of barbarian warfare, aimed his light-armed troops (peltasts) with a spear about twelve feet long. Twenty feet was astonishing, but, when not used in a phalanx, probably unmanageably long. The Macedonian sarissa of Alexander the Great’s day was thirteen to fourteen feet.

7. This must have been the headwaters of the Çoruh. Gymnias must have been between that river and Trapezus (Trebizond, Trabzon), and Mount Thekes on the range which runs parallel to the coast. It is not impossible that the Greeks somewhere joined the route from modern Erzerum to Trabzon and that Gymnias is modern Gümüsane and Mount Thekes the Zigana Pass, but Xenophon’s narrative is here a poor guide.