Polybius PDF
Preview Polybius
SATHER CLASSICAL LECTURES Volume Forty-two POLYBIUS POLYBIUS by F. W. WALBANK UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS BERKELEY, LOS ANGELES, LONDON UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS BERKELEY AND LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS, LTD. LONDON, ENGLAND ©1972 BY THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA FIRST PAPERBACK PRINTING 1990 ISBN: 0-520-06981-1 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER: 72-189219 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 BERKELEIENSIBUS CETERISQ,UE SANCTI FRANCISCI SINUM HABITANTIBUS AMICIS D. D. D. Contents Preface lX I The Man and His Work I II Historical Traditions 32 III Pragmatikeh istoria 66 IV Some Structural Problems: Time and Place 97 V The Sixth Book 130 VI Polybius and Rome 157 Abbreviations and Select Bibliography 184 Index I General 189 II Authors and Passages 197 III Inscriptions 200 IV Greek 200 [vii] Preface Many of the ideas in this book have emerged over the years that I have spent working on a historical commentary on Poly bius. Writing a commentary is a discipline which occasionally begins to feel like a strait-jacket; and every commentator, I sus pect, sooner or later feels the urge to break out and write a more general book about his particular author, something, as Polybius would say, more creuµaToe1611Ws. hen, or indeed whether, left to myself, I should eventually have got round to doing this, I cannot say. Fortunately, I had my mind and resolution suitably con centrated when the University of California at Berkeley honoured me with an invitation to deliver the Sather Lectures for 1970/71. This book is the fruit of that invitation and it is a pleasant duty to acknowledge debts incurred in its writing and publication: to the University of Liverpool for releasing me from my normal duties to take up the Sather Professorship; to Mr M. H. Crawford for his kindness in reading the manuscript and the proofs to my considerable advantage; to my wife for help with the index; and to Mr August Fruge and his colleagues in the University of California Press and to the staff of the Cambridge University Printing House for their expedition and invariable help and courtesy while the book was in their hands. I thank them all ·warmly. The lectures are printed almost as they were delivered in Dwindle Hall in the winter quarter of 1971. It was a time that will remain memorable for the pleasure of living and working in Berkeley (hie ver adsiduum atque alienis mensibus aestas !) and even more for the kindness and hospitality which were constantly shown to my wife and myself by Professor W. S. Anderson, the Head of the Classics Department, and his colleagues in the Classics and History Departments ( and their wives) and by the members of my graduate class. It therefore seems fitting that the book should be inscribed to them and to our other friends, old and new, in the Bay Area who in countless ways helped to render our stay in California so enjoyable. F. W.W. Universiryo f Liverpool July 1972 [ix]
The list of books you might like
