thirdly, no member of one canton might own property in another: fourthly, the Boeotians were ordered to pay a heavy compensation to the Heracleots and Euboeans, and the Achaeans to the Spartans: lastly, a fixed tribute to Rome was imposed on all states in Greece.53 Some of these measures were in a few years’ time relaxed, the fines were mitigated, the rule against inter-possession of property was abolished, and the league assemblies were again allowed for certain local purposes. But this was the end of the league as a free federation. It is often said that “Greece was now reduced to the form of a Roman province under the name of Achaia.” This is true in a sense, and yet is misleading. Achaia did not become a province like the other provinces, yearly allotted to a proconsul or propraetor or legatus, until the time of Augustus. Such direct interference from a Roman magistrate as was thought necessary was left to the governor of Macedonia.54 Yet in a certain sense Achaia was treated as a separate entity, and had a “formula,” or constitution, founded on the separate local laws which the 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 Mantinea55 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, from 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