1. The following account makes no claim to originality, and as it is impossible in a short introduction to do justice to all that has been written on the Laches, it should be taken as no more than a general survey. Acknowledgement is due to all those whose work is cited in notes and in the bibliography. For a view somewhat different from those discussed below, see Buford.

2. For examples of this view see J. Burnet, Platonism (Berkeley 1928), pp. 3–15; A. E. Taylor, Plato: The Man and His Work (London 1926), p. 58; U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Platon: Sein Leben und seine Wake (Berlin 1959), p. 141; cf. Croiset, p. 88, who calls the Laches ‘une simple exposition de methode’.