“I am not unaware that my work owing to the uniformity of its composition has a certain severity, and will suit the taste and gain the approval of only one class of reader.”

Well I like him, but at some point some twit has been in possession of the last complete copy of this work. His house has been on fire and having the choice of the book or his kid he has chosen poorly. I think it says something about the quality of Polybius’s writing that even truncated as it is it’s still brilliant. And some of these fragments are really meaty.

In the first half of the book there are a series of character studies of various generals- Hannibal, Scipio etc- followed by some account of their doings. Scipio’s attack on New Carthage being a particular gem. I read this without access to a plan of the city but had a totally clear idea of the geography. When I got online and checked, my image and the plan were surprisingly close. A testament to the total precision of the writing.

There follows a long fragment where Polybius lays into Timaeus, a fellow historian whose work has not survived. This is far beyond literary criticism or even a hatchet job. He displays the kind of hatred and rage you normally only see in religious writing. It’s sometimes quite funny, but not always for the reason Polybius intends. It’s in total contrast to his historical writing and I did wonder if he were entirely sane.

The second half of the book recounts the final confrontation of Scipio and Hannibal in Africa. I’ve been waiting for this since volume two. There’s the most amazing scene where the two generals meet alone to parley. The young Scipio neatly representing the new barbarians on the block and the older Hannibal representing an ancient sea-faring civilisation and pleading for its existence. Scipio says “ok” and they all go and have tea. No not really. ( )