Editing Epaminondas (section)

==Historical sources==
The life of Epaminondas is very poorly attested in the ancient sources, especially compared to some of his near contemporaries (e.g. [[Philip II of Macedon]] and [[Pelopidas]]). One principal reason for this is the [[Lost literary work|loss]] of [[Plutarch]]'s biography of him. Epaminondas was one of approximately 50 ancient figures given an extensive biography by Plutarch in his ''[[Parallel Lives]]'', in which he is paired with the Roman statesman [[Scipio Africanus]]; however, both of these parts of ''Lives'' are now lost.{{sfn|Buckley|2010|p=12}} Plutarch wrote his biography over 400 years after Epaminondas's death and is therefore very much a secondary source, but he often explicitly names his sources, which allows some degree of verification of his statements.{{citation needed|date=January 2022}}

Some episodes of Epaminondas's life can be found in Plutarch's ''Lives'' of Pelopidas and [[Agesilaus II]], who were contemporaries. There is also a surviving (and possibly abridged) biography of Epaminondas by the Roman author [[Cornelius Nepos]] from the first century&nbsp;BC which, in the absence of Plutarch's, becomes a major source for Epaminondas's life.

The period of Greek history from 411–362&nbsp;BC is primarily attested by the historian, contemporary and direct witness [[Xenophon]], his work being a continuation of [[Thucydides]]'s ''[[History of the Peloponnesian War]]''. Xenophon, who was partial to Sparta and its king, Agesilaus, does not always mention Epaminondas himself and does not note his presence at the [[Battle of Leuctra]].{{sfn|Cawkwell|1979|pp=35{{ndash}}36}}{{sfn|Hanson|1993|p=145}}{{sfn|Hanson|1999<!-- |p= -->}}{{page needed|date=January 2022}} However, Xenophon tells us of Epaminondas's last battle and death, which is told in the last and seventh book of the ''Hellenica''.

Epaminondas's role in the conflicts of the 4th century is also described, much later, by [[Diodorus Siculus]], in his ''[[Bibliotheca historica]]''. Diodorus was writing in the 1st century BC, and is also very much a secondary source,{{sfn|Green|2007|pp=xxiv{{ndash}}xxv}} though useful for corroborating details found elsewhere.{{sfn|Lazenby|1993|p=7}}