that reflects Xenophon’s admiration for Cyrus the Younger. Among other errors is his assertion that Cyrus the Great conquered Egypt and that he passed away peacefully. Finally, we have the account of Ctesias, the Greek physician of Artaxerxes II, who falsely depicted Cyrus as the son of a Persian bandit and a shepherdess. Ctesias, who should have had access to Persian documents, is a disappointingly unreliable source. Plutarch, who used Ctesias, comments: “It is not infrequent with him [Ctesias]