He was of an honorable family, though left poor...but he was among the best educated among the Thebans; he had been taught to play the harp and to sing to its accompaniment by Dionysius [a famous musician], to play the flute by Olympiodorus, and to dance by Calliphron. For his instructor in philosophy he had Lysis of Tarentum, a Pythagorean, to whom he was so devoted that---young as he was---he preferred the society of a grave and austere old man, instead of companions of his own age.
-- Life of Epaminondas by Cornelius Nepos

Born in 418 BCE, Epaminondas was, as noted by the Roman biographer above, a member of a Theban aristocratic family which, though without wealth, granted the future general a superior education. Intellectually and physically endowed, Epaminondas matured during the struggles of Thebes against the hegemonic authority of Sparta. During the Spartan occupation of Thebes, Epaminondas organized the liberation effort from within the city with the support of Athens. Alongside his colleagues Pelopidas and Gorgidas, Epaminondas led the overthrow of the Spartans in Thebes in 379.

Following the Theban liberation, Epaminondas became a statesman, elected one of the seven Boeotarch who led the newly established Boiotian Confederacy by 371. In that year, an invasion of Boiotia by Sparta was challenged by Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra. Leading the Theban forces, Epaminondas recognized that the outnumbered Thebans could not defeat the Spartans. Instead, Epaminondas moved the elite Sacred Band unit from the right flank to the left, where, led by Pelopidas, they would engage the Spartan elite. Additionally, the ranks of the Theban phalanxes on the left flank were redoubled in numbers. While the weak Theban right flank was ordered to retreat and regroup continuously, the left flank broke through the Spartan lines and caused massive casualties in their ranks, a consequence of which was the start of the decline of Spartan military power.

In 370 Epaminondas invaded the Peloponnese, liberating both Acardia and Messenia from Sparta, and establishing them as regional counterbalances to the waning hegemon. Returning to Thebes, Epaminondas was condemned to death for exceeding the limits of his constitutionally defined powers as Boeotarch. The charges were dropped, enabling a second Peloponnese campaign in 369, after which he was again indicted and acquitted. The efforts of Epaminondas, and his political ally Pelopidas, resulted in the rise of Thebes as the latest, and final, hegemonic city-state in Hellas. With the defeat and death of Pelopidas in 364, Thebes had become the new evil, and thereby rallying point, in Hellenic politics.

The second Battle of Mantinea in 362 was both Epaminondas’s finest hour and one of the greatest Hellenic engagements of history. Duplicating the tactics at Leuctra, the Thebans and their allies successfully broke the lines of Sparta and her allies. As the pursuit of the retreating Spartans began Epaminondas fell from a mortal wound. He was, according to the Roman Cicero, "the first man…of Greece."

Sources:	Credits:
Bits of News: Epaminondas and Thebes Perseus Digital Library: Pindar, Odes	The Death of Epaminondas by David d'Angers, edited Source