Four years ago, when the "Ancient Writers" series by "Zitros Publications" introduced Xenophon’s Agesilaus to the Greek public, I had the opportunity to write a preface for the edition, where I spoke about the most essential qualities of this ancient writer.

I spoke of Xenophon as a persistent "hunter" of adventure. I spoke of Xenophon as a captivating storyteller of all kinds of adventures he experienced. I spoke of Xenophon as a persuasive biographer-presenter of great personalities that his homeland produced, "infallible, essentially, teachers of behavior, since they could equip every Greek with useful criteria in their effort (and desire) to distinguish right from wrong in their daily functioning within the city." And all this was accomplished by Xenophon with a truly exemplary discourse, a discourse that embodies all the virtues of the Attic dialect - a quality for which this Athenian offspring earned the title of "Attic bee," evidently due to the sweetness of his style!

The perfectly comprehensible way in which he presented matters and his concise and clear speech were indeed among the main elements that ultimately led to the preservation of the works of this Attic writer. However, Xenophon, apart from all this, was also something else: an exceptionally honorable man who, throughout his life, dedicated himself, with persistence and consistency, to the "pursuit" of virtue, which he considered - foremost - a great gain for himself and wanted - subsequently - to project it as a model to all others. For what other reason did he "biograph" - in his own, of course, way - his beloved teacher, Socrates?

In this context belongs his work that has been handed down to us under the title "Oeconomicus," an essentially didactic work focused on domestic and agricultural, thus private, "economy," while also being a genuinely captivating work. This is one of Xenophon's works in which his great teacher appears as a speaker, but this time with a notable peculiarity: this time Socrates merely transmits what he learned from Ischomachus, who once explained to his young wife how he spends each day and how he divides his tasks in his household. So, a work that, besides the "economic" information it conveys, also provides us with extremely useful, truly valuable information regarding the position of women in that distant era: the practical advice contained in this work ensured that it won - for a long time throughout the passage of time - the favor and appreciation of the reading public.