Polybius
- LAST REVIEWED: 28 July 2021
- LAST MODIFIED: 28 July 2021
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195389661-0047
- LAST REVIEWED: 28 July 2021
- LAST MODIFIED: 28 July 2021
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195389661-0047
Introduction
Polybius is the most important source for the rise of Roman imperialism during the Middle Roman Republic (c. 265–c. 150 BCE). By ancient historiographical standards, his work is of the highest quality, and in this regard he is often compared with Thucydides. To be sure, his Greek prose style is inelegant—so much so that the ancient literary critic Dionysius of Halicarnassus remarked that no one could endure reading his work to the end (On Composition, 4). But Polybius’s stringent demands for historical accuracy, as well as the monumental importance of his theme—accounting for Rome’s rise to world power—more than compensate for his deficiencies in style. His political theory, and especially his ideas on the mixed constitution and government by a system of checks and balances, has had a profound impact on subsequent political thinkers in the Western tradition.
Style
The ancient literary critic Dionysius of Halicarnassus (On Composition, 4) condemned Polybius’s prose style as rough and inelegant, and Polybius himself stated that he was concerned with the accurate reporting of facts rather than with an entertaining and engaging writing style (cf. Histories, 16.20). Nevertheless, modern scholars have exhaustively analyzed Polybius’s prose composition, with Foucault 1972 being a stellar example of close analysis of the stylistic nuances and grammatical idiosyncrasies of Polybius’s Greek prose. Dubuisson 1985 provided a fine study of the ways in which Polybius’s long sojourn in Rome and exposure to the Latin language left imprints on his Greek composition. Langslow 2012 updates research since the seminal studies of Foucault and Dubuisson on Polybius’s use of language. McGing 2010 has recently shown that despite his own protestations, Polybius was not indifferent to questions of style, and that we can genuinely talk about artistic dimensions in his history.
Dubuisson, Michel. 1985. Le Latin de Polybe: Implications historiques d’un cas de bilinguisme. Paris: Klincksieck.
Important study on the evidence for Polybius’s bilingualism and the Latin influences on his Greek prose.
Foucault, Jules A. 1972. Recherches sur la langue et le style de Polybe. Paris: Les Belles Lettres.
Exhaustive analysis of Polybius’s Greek prose style.
Langslow, David R. 2012. The language of Polybius since Foucault and Dubuisson. In Imperialism, cultural politics, and Polybius. Edited by Christopher J. Smith and Liv M. Yarrow, 85–112. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199600755.003.0006
This article takes account of the most-recent scholarly work on Polybius’s language and prose style.
McGing, Brian C. 2010. Polybius: The Histories. Oxford Approaches to Classical Literature. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
An excellent general introduction to Polybius’s techniques as historian, pp. 95–128.
Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on this page. Please subscribe or login.
How to Subscribe
Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here.
Article
- Academy, The
- Acropolis of Athens, The
- Aeschylus
- Aeschylus’s Oresteia
- Aesthetics, Greek and Roman
- Africa, Roman
- Agathias
- Agriculture in the Classical World
- Agriculture, Roman
- Alcibiades
- Alexander of Aphrodisias
- Alexander the Great
- Amicitia
- Ammianus Marcellinus
- Amyklaion
- Anatolian, Greek and
- Anaxagoras
- Ancient Classical Scholarship
- Ancient Greek and Latin Grammarians
- Ancient Greek Terracotta Sculpture
- Ancient Mediterranean Baths and Bathing
- Ancient Olympia
- Ancient Skepticism
- Ancient Thebes
- Antisthenes
- Antonines, The
- Aphrodite
- Apollodorus
- Apollonius of Rhodes
- Appendix Vergiliana
- Apuleius
- Apuleius's Platonism
- Ara Pacis Augustae
- Arabic “Theology of Aristotle”, The
- Aratus
- Archaeology, Greek
- Archaeology, Roman
- Archaic Latin
- Architecture, Etruscan
- Architecture, Greek
- Architecture, Roman
- Arena Spectacles
- Aristophanes
- Aristophanes’ Clouds
- Aristophanes’ Lysistrata
- Aristotle
- Aristotle, Ancient Commentators on
- Aristotle's Categories
- Aristotle's Ethics
- Aristotle's Metaphysics
- Aristotle's Philosophy of Mind
- Aristotle’s Physics
- Aristotle's Politics
- Art and Archaeology, Research Resources for Classical
- Art, Etruscan
- Art, Greek
- Art, Late Antique
- Artemis
- Asconius
- Athena
- Athenaeus of Naucratis
- Athenian Agora
- Athenian Economy
- Attic Middle Comic Fragments
- Augustine
- Augustus
- Aulularia, Plautus’s
- Aulus Gellius
- Ausonius
- Bacchylides
- Banking in the Roman World
- Bilingualism and Multilingualism in the Roman World
- Biography, Greek and Latin
- Birds, Aristophanes'
- Boethius
- Britain, Roman
- Bronze Age Aegean, Death and Burial in the
- Caecilius Statius
- Caere/Cerveteri
- Callimachus of Cyrene
- Carthage, Punic
- Casina, Plautus’s
- Cato the Censor
- Cato the Younger
- Catullus
- Christianity, Early
- Chronicles
- Cicero
- Cicero’s Philosophical Works
- Cicero's Pro Archia
- Cicero's Rhetorical Works
- Cicero's Speeches: Individual Speeches
- Cicero's Speeches: Overviews and Themes
- Cities in the Roman World
- Classical Architecture in Europe and North America since 1...
- Classical Architecture in Renaissance and Early Modern Eur...
- Classical Art History, History of Scholarship of
- Classics and Cinema
- Classics and Dance
- Classics and Opera
- Classics and Shakespeare
- Classics and the Victorians
- Claudian (Claudius Claudianus)
- Cleisthenes
- Cleopatra
- Codicology/Paleography, Greek
- Collegia, Roman
- Colonization in the Roman Empire
- Colonization in the Roman Republic
- Columella
- Constantine
- Corippus
- Corpus Tibullianum Book Three
- Countryside, Roman
- Crete, Ancient
- Critias of Athens
- Death
- Death and Burial in the Roman Age
- Declamation
- Democritus
- Demography, Ancient
- Demosthenes
- Dio, Cassius
- Diodorus Siculus
- Diogenes Laertius
- Dionysus
- Donatus
- Doxography, Ancient
- Drama, Latin
- Economy, Roman
- Education
- Egypt, Hellenistic and Roman
- Emotions
- Empedocles
- Ennius
- Epictetus
- Epicurean Ethics
- Epicureanism
- Epigram, Greek Inscribed
- Epigrams, Greek Poetry
- Epigraphy, Greek
- Epigraphy, Latin
- Eratosthenes of Cyrene
- Etruscans
- Etymology, Greek Lexicon and
- Euripides
- Euripides' Alcestis
- Euripides’ Bacchae
- Euripides’ Electra
- Euripides' Orestes
- Euripides’ Trojan Women
- Fabius Pictor
- Family, Roman
- Federal States, Greek
- Festus
- Fishing and Aquaculture, Roman
- Flavian Literature
- Fragments, Greek Old Comic
- Frontiers of the Roman Empire
- Galen
- Gardens, Greek and Roman
- Gaul, Roman
- Geography
- Gracchi Brothers, The
- Greek and Roman Logic
- Greek Colonization
- Greek Domestic Architecture c. 800 bce to c. 100 bce
- Greek Epic, The Language of the
- Greek New Comic Fragments
- Greek Originals and Roman Copies
- Greek Prehistory Through the Bronze Age
- Greek Vase Painting
- Hellenistic Tragedy
- Heracles
- Heraclitus
- Herculaneum (Modern Ercolano)
- Herculaneum Papyri
- Heritage Management
- Hermes
- Herodas
- Herodotus
- Hesiod
- Historia Augusta
- Historiography, Greek
- Historiography, Latin
- History, Greek: Archaic to Classical Age
- History, Greek: Hellenistic
- History of Modern Classical Scholarship (Since 1750), The
- History, Roman: Early to the Republic
- History, Roman: Imperial, 31 BCE–284 CE
- History, Roman: Late Antiquity
- Homer
- Homeric Hymns
- Homo novus/New man
- Horace
- Horace's Epistles and Ars Poetica
- Horace’s Epodes
- Horace’s Odes
- Horace's Satires
- Imperialism, Roman
- Indo-European, Greek and
- Indo-European, Latin and
- Intertextuality in Latin Poetry
- Isocrates
- Isthmia
- Jews and Judaism
- Juvenal
- Knossos, Prehistoric
- Koine, The
- Lactantius
- Land-Surveyors
- Language, Ancient Greek
- Languages, Italic
- Latin, Medieval
- Latin Paleography, Editing, and the Transmission of Classi...
- Latin Particles and Word Order
- Latin Poetry, Epigrams and Satire in
- Law, Greek
- Law, Roman
- Lexicography, Greek
- Lexicography, Latin
- Linguistics, Indo-European
- Literary Criticism, Ancient
- Literary Languages of Greek, The
- Literary Letters, Greek
- Literary Letters, Roman
- Literature, Hellenistic
- Literature, Neo-Latin
- Livy
- Looting and the Antiquities Market
- Lucan
- Lucilius
- Lucretius
- Lysias
- Macedonia
- Macrobius
- Maecenas
- Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World
- Maps
- Marcus Aurelius's Meditations
- Marcus Cornelius Fronto
- Marcus Manilius
- Maritime Archaeology of the Ancient Mediterranean
- Marius and Sulla
- Martial
- Maximianus
- Mechanics
- Medea, Seneca's
- Menander of Athens
- Metaphysics, Greek and Roman
- Metrics, Greek
- Middle Platonism
- Military, Greek
- Military, Roman
- Miltiades of Cimon
- Minor Socratics
- Mosaics, Greek and Roman
- Mythography
- Mythology
- Narratology and the Classics
- Neoplatonism
- Neoteric Poets, The
- Nepos, Cornelius
- Nonius Marcellus
- Nonnus
- Novel, Roman
- Novel, The Greek
- Numismatics, Greek and Roman
- Onomastics
- Optimates/Populares
- Orosius
- Orpheus and Orphism
- Ovid
- Ovid’s Exile Poetry
- Ovid’s Love Poetry
- Ovid's Metamorphoses
- Painting, Greek
- Panaetius of Rhodes
- Panathenaic Festival, the
- Pantheon
- Papyrology: Literary and Documentary
- Parmenides
- Parthenon
- Parthian Empire, The
- Pausanias
- Performance Culture, Greek
- Perikles (Pericles)
- Petronius
- Philo of Alexandria
- Philodemus of Gadara
- Philoponus
- Philosophy, Dialectic in Ancient Greek and Roman
- Philosophy, Greek
- Philosophy of Language, Ancient
- Philosophy, Presocratic
- Philosophy, Roman
- Philostratus, Lucius Flavius
- Pindar
- Plato
- Plato’s Apology of Socrates
- Plato’s Crito
- Plato's Laws
- Plato’s Metaphysics
- Plato’s Phaedo
- Plato’s Philebus
- Plato’s Sophist
- Plato's Symposium
- Plato’s Theaetetus
- Plato's Timaeus
- Plautus
- Plautus’s Amphitruo
- Plautus’s Curculio
- Plautus’s Miles Gloriosus
- Pliny the Elder
- Pliny the Younger
- Plotinus
- Plutarch's Moralia
- Poetic Meter, Latin
- Poetry, Greek: Elegiac and Lyric
- Poetry, Greek: Iambos
- Poetry, Greek: Pre-Hellenistic
- Poetry, Latin: From the Beginnings through the End of the ...
- Poetry, Latin: Imperial
- Polis
- Political Philosophy, Greek and Roman
- Polybius
- Pompeii
- Porphyry
- Posidippus of Pella
- Posidonius
- Poverty in the Roman World
- Proclus
- Prometheus
- Prometheus, Aeschylus'
- Propertius
- Prosopography
- Protagoras
- Prudentius
- Pyrrho of Elis
- Pythagoreanism
- Quintilian
- Religion, Greek
- Religion, Roman
- Rhetoric, Greek
- Rhetoric, Latin
- Roman Agricultural Writers, The
- Roman Consulship, The
- Roman Italy, 4th Century bce to 3rd Century ce
- Roman Kingship
- Roman Patronage
- Roman Roads and Transport
- Sacrifice
- Sallust
- Samnites
- Samothrace
- Sappho
- Sardis, Ancient
- Scholia
- Science, Greek and Roman
- Sculpture, Etruscan
- Sculpture, Greek
- Sculpture, Roman
- Seneca the Elder
- Seneca the Younger's Philosophical Works
- Seneca’s Oedipus
- Seneca's Phaedra
- Seneca's Tragedies
- Severans, The
- Sexuality
- Silius Italicus
- Slavery, Greek
- Slavery, Roman
- Socrates
- Solon
- Sophocles
- Sophocles’ Ajax
- Sophocles’ Antigone
- Sophocles’ Electra
- Sophocles’ Fragments
- Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus
- Sophocles’ Oedipus the King
- Sophocles’ Philoctetes
- Sophocles’ Trachiniae
- Sosipatra
- Spain, Roman
- Sparta
- Sport
- Statius
- Stesichorus of Himera
- Stoicism
- Strabo
- Suetonius
- Symposion, Greek
- Tacitus
- Technology, Greek and Roman
- Terence
- Terence’s Adelphoe
- Terence’s Eunuchus
- Tertullian
- The Sophists
- The Tabula Peutingeriana (Peutinger Map)
- Theater Production, Greek
- Theocritus of Syracuse
- Theoderic the Great and Ostrogothic Italy
- Theophrastus of Eresus
- Thucydides
- Tibullus
- Topography of Athens
- Topography of Rome
- Tragic Chorus, The
- Translation and Classical Reception
- Transmission of Greek and Latin Literature
- Valerius Flaccus
- Valerius Maximus
- Varro, Marcus Terentius
- Veii
- Velleius Paterculus
- Virgil
- Vitruvius
- Wall Painting, Etruscan
- Xenophanes
- Xenophon
- Zeno of Elea
- Zeus