[758] The statement of Diodorus (xv, 87) on this point appears to me more probable than that of Xenophon (vii, 5, 26).
The Athenians boasted much of this slight success with their cavalry, enhancing its value by acknowledging that all their allies had been defeated around them (Plutarch, De Gloriâ Athen. p. 350 A.).
[759] Diodor. xv, 88; Cicero, De Finibus, ii, 30, 97; Epistol. ad Familiares, v, 12, 5.
[760] Plutarch, Apophthegm. Regum, p. 194 C.; Ælian, V. H. xii, 3.
Both Plutarch and Diodorus talk of Epaminondas being carried back to the camp. But it seems that there could hardly have been any camp. Epaminondas had marched out only a few hours before from Tegea. A tent may have been erected on the field to receive him. Five centuries afterwards, the Mantineans showed to the traveller Pausanias a spot called Skiopê near the field of battle, to which (they affirmed) the wounded Epaminondas had been carried off, in great pain, and with his hand on his wound—from whence he had looked with anxiety on the continuing battle (Pausan. viii, 11, 4).
[761] Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 35; Pausanias, i, 3, 3; viii, 9, 2-5; viii, 11, 4; ix, 15, 3.
The reports however which Pausanias gives, and the name of Machærion which he heard both at Mantinea and at Sparta, are confused, and are hardly to be reconciled with the story of Plutarch.
Moreover, it would seem that the subsequent Athenians did not clearly distinguish between the first battle fought by the Athenian cavalry, immediately after their arrival at Mantinea, when they rescued that town from being surprised by the Thebans and Thessalians—and the general action which followed a few days afterwards wherein Epaminondas was slain.
[762] See the oration of Demosthenes on behalf of the Megalopolitans (Orat. xvi, s. 10, p. 204; s. 21, p. 206).
[763] Plutarch, Agesilaus, c. 35; Diodor. xv, 89; Polybius, iv, 33.