What’s that? You say you’re dying for more decapitating good times from the olden days. Like really, really olden days, back when they still talked kinda funny? Well you’re in luck, cheerios, because Columbia pictures has acquired the true story of the Ten Thousands for your cinematic pleasure. The film, to be called “Anabasis”, will be based on a memoir written around 400 B.C. by a Greek soldier named Xenophon, who led 10,000 Greek mercs back after their attempt to take down the Persian Empire sort of, well, didn’t work out so well. The whole thing was supposedly the inspiration for Walter Hill’s 1979 movie “The Warriors”.

Variety has your ancient skinny:

Columbia will turn the story of an ancient Greek military expedition into an epic action film.

The studio has acquired a pitch for an adaptation of “Anabasis,” a memoir written around 400 B.C. by Xenophon, a Greek soldier who was among 10,000 elite mercenaries who attacked the Persian Empire and who led them back through hostile terrain after their leader was betrayed and slain.

Script will be written by Robert Schenkkan, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright who just served as writer and co-producer on HBO miniseries “The Pacific.” Jimmy Miller will team with Robbie and Jonathan Stamp to produce under Miller’s Sony-based Mosaic label.

You know, I was kinda into Greek stuff in college, but I don’t think I even heard of the Ten Thousand. Then again, I can barely read, and I’m actually typing this using my typing Monkey (they’re cheap, what can I say) as I dictate to it, so what do I know. Here’s Wikipedia’s more in-depth take on the Greek tale:

Xenophon accompanied the Ten Thousand, a large army of Greek mercenaries hired by Cyrus the Younger, who intended to seize the throne of Persia from his brother, Artaxerxes II. Though Cyrus’s army was victorious at Cunaxa in Babylon (401 BC), Cyrus himself was killed in the battle, rendering the victory irrelevant and the expedition a failure.

Stranded deep in enemy territory, the Spartan general Clearchus and the other Greek senior officers were subsequently killed or captured by treachery on the part of the Persian satrap Tissaphernes. Xenophon played an instrumental role in encouraging the Greek army of 10,000 to march north to the Black Sea. Now abandoned in Mesopotamia, without supplies other than what they could obtain by force, the 10,000 had to fight their way northwards through Kurdistan and Armenia, making ad hoc decisions about their leadership, tactics, and destiny.

Sounds like fun times, though. Except, you know, for the ones that get skewered with spears, I mean. Because, let’s face it, when the ancient Greeks get together, you just know spears are gonna be skewering things.

By the way, they should probably change the title to “The Ten Thousand”. It sounds better than “Anabasis”, that’s for sure.