Editing Isocrates (section)

== Early life and influences ==
Isocrates was born into a prosperous family in [[Athens]] at the height of Athens' power shortly before the outbreak of the [[Peloponnesian War]] (431–404 BC). [[Suda]] writes that Isocrates was the son of Theodorus who owned a workshop that manufactured [[aulos]]. His mother's name was Heduto. He had a sister and three brothers; two of the brothers were Tisippos ([[Ancient Greek language|Ancient Greek]]: Τίσιππος) and Theomnestos (Ancient Greek: Θεόμνηστος).<ref name= Papillon2004>{{Cite book |author= Isocrates |translator= Terry L. Papillon |year=2004 |title= Isocrates II | publisher=University of Texas Press |isbn=978-0-292-70245-5 |location=Austin, Texas |id={{ProQuest| }} }}</ref><ref>{{Cite encyclopedia |title=SOL Search: iota,652| encyclopedia= SUDA Encyclopedia |url=https://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/sol/sol-entries/iota/652 |access-date=7 September 2020 |via= cs.uky.edu| publisher= University of Kentucky}}</ref>

Isocrates received a first-rate education. "He is reported to have studied with several prominent teachers, including [[Tisias]] (one of the traditional founders of rhetoric), the sophists [[Prodicus]] and [[Gorgias]], and the moderate [[Oligarchy|oligarch]] [[Theramenes]], and to have associated with [[Socrates]], but these reports may reflect later views of his intellectual roots more than historical fact".<ref name= Papillon2004 />

He passed his youth in a period following the death of [[Pericles]], a time in which "wealth – both public and private – was dissipated", and "political decision were ill-conceived and violent" according to the 2020 Encyclopedia Britannica. Isocrates would have been 14 years old when the democracy voted to kill all the male citizens of the small [[Thracians|Thracian]] city of [[Scione]].<ref>{{Cite encyclopedia |last=Cawkwell |first=G. Law. |date=27 August 2020 |title=Isocrates |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isocrates |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopedia Britannica]]}}</ref> There are accounts, including that of Isocrates himself,<ref>{{Cite book | author= Isocrates| title= Antidosis| volume= Section 161 |url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Isoc.%2015.161&lang=original |access-date=7 September 2020 |via= perseus.tufts.edu |quote=I had lost in the Peloponnesian War the patrimony which remained to me from what my father had spent....}}</ref> stating that the [[Peloponnesian War]] wiped out his father's estate, and Isocrates was forced to earn a living.<ref>{{Cite web| first= J.F.| last= Dobson |title= Chapter 6: Isocrates| work= The Greek Orators |url= https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0075:chapter=6 |access-date=7 September 2020 |via= perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref>

Late in his life, he married a woman named Plathane (daughter of the [[sophist]] [[Hippias]]) and adopted [[Aphareus (writer)]], one of her sons by a previous marriage.<ref name= Papillon2004 />