After the death of Cyrus on the plains of Cunaxa, the barbarian auxiliaries fled, and the Greeks were left to return as they could from the far region between the Tigris and Euphrates.

Xenophon had to take part in the conduct of the retreat, and tells the story of it in his "Anabasis," a history of the expedition of the younger Cyrus and of the retreat of the Greeks.

His return into Greece was in the year of the death of Socrates, B.C.399, but his association was now with the Spartans, with whom he fought, B.C.394, at Coroneia.

Afterwards he settled, and lived for about twenty years, at Scillus in Eleia with his wife and children.

At Scillus he wrote probably his "Anabasis" and some other of his books.