Proleptic Moves in Xenophon’s Narrative of Mantinea (Hellenica 7.5) The Fog of War

The final campaign described in Xenophon’s Hellenica is the Theban general Epaminondas’ incursion into the Peloponnese and the ensuing Battle of Mantinea. Epaminondas faces a coalition of Spartans, other Peloponnesians, and Athenians, ultimately suffering a defeat and losing his life. Xenophon ends the Hellenica by suggesting that the gods arranged for each side to claim victory, resulting in greater disorder and chaos in Greece (7.5.26–27). Divine logic is apparently not necessarily the same as human logic: divine ‘order’ will often manifest itself on the human plane as disorder. This chapter argues that Xenophon continuously prompts readers to question the how and why of the Mantinea campaign, but ultimately suggests that these questions have no definitive answers. He uses proleptic moves to create ‘virtual narratives’ (as defined by Ryan). These include strategically mentioning ‘Mantinea’ to raise expectations and questions about Epaminondas’ delays, and intermittently revealing the Athenians’ plans to provoke curiosity about their role. He also includes narratorial comments on leadership, making readers ponder its impact, and focalized passages on Epaminondas’ plans regarding numerical superiority, discipline, and novel tactics. Ultimately, Xenophon reflects on the causes of victory and defeat in Greek military discourse, showing that none of the anticipated outcomes from these ‘virtual narratives’ come to pass. In the end, he turns to the divine as the ultimate source of order amidst human chaos.