HKB
commissioners found existing, or imposed, with the help of Polybius, on the several states; it paid tribute like other provinces, and was in fact, though called free, subject to Rome.
Polybius performed his task of visiting the various towns in the Peloponnese, explaining when necessary the meaning of the new arrangements, and advising them, when they had to make others for themselves, so much to the satisfaction of every one, that there was a universal feeling that he had been a benefactor to his country, and had made the best of their situation that could be made. Statues of him are mentioned by Pausanias in several places in the Peloponnese: in Mantinea[55] and at Megalopolis,[56] with an inscription in elegiacs to the effect that “he had travelled over every land and sea; was an ally of the Romans, and mitigated their wrath against Greece.” Another in the temple of Persephone, near Acacesium,[57] under which was a legend stating that “Greece would not have erred at all if she had obeyed Polybius; and that when she did err, he alone proved of any help to her.” There were others also at Pallantium,[58] Tegea,[59] and Olympia.[60]
In these services to his country Polybius was occupied in B.C. 145. Of his life after that we have no detailed record. He is believed to have visited Scipio while engaged on the siege of Numantia (B.C. 134-132), on which he wrote a separate treatise.[61] We know also that he visited Alexandria in the reign of Ptolemy Physcon (B.C. 146-117), and expressed his contempt for the state of the people and their rulers.[62] These years must have been also much occupied with the extension of his history, which he originally intended should end with the fall of the Macedonian kingdom (B.C. 168),[63] but which was afterwards continued to the fall of Carthage and Greece (B.C. 146);[64] for even if the history had been completed up to its originally intended limit, and the notice of extension afterwards inserted, there still was enough to do to occupy some years of a busy life; especially as he seems to have carried out his principle that an historian ought to be a traveller, visiting the localities of which he speaks, and testing by personal inspection the possibility of the military evolutions which he undertakes to describe. His travels appear certainly to have embraced the greater part of Gaul, and it even seems possible from one passage that he visited Britain.[65] His explorations on the African coast were doubtless extensive, and he appears to have visited Phoenicia, Cilicia, and Asia Minor. We hear of him at Sardis, though we cannot fix the date of the visit.[66] Lastly, Lucian tells us that, “returning from the country, he had a fall from his horse, the effects of which he died at the age of eighty-two.” No place is given, and no clue which may help us to be certain of the date.[67] Polybius, besides the general history, had written a treatise on Tactics,[68] a panegyric on Philopoemen,[69] a history of the Numantine war,[70] and perhaps a treatise on public speaking (δημηγορία).[71]
§ 2.—THE SOURCES OF POLYBIUS’S HISTORY
Polybius always maintains that the study of documents is only one, and not the most important, element in the equipment of an historian. The best is personal experience and personal inquiry.
[Sidenote: Personal knowledge.]
Of the sources of his own history, then, the first and best may be set down as knowledge acquired by being actually present at great events, such as the destruction of Carthage and the sack of Corinth; visits to the Roman army in camp; assisting at actual debates in his own country; personal knowledge of and service under men of the first position in Achaia; personal visits to famous localities; voyages and tours undertaken for the definite object of inspection and inquiry; and, lastly, seeing and questioning the survivors of great battles, or the men who had played a leading part in conspicuous political transactions.