‘Organic whole’
Polybius writes, “from this point onwards history becomes an organic whole: the affairs of Italy and of Africa are connected with those of Asia and of Greece, and all events bear a relationship and contribute to a single end.” The emblematic ‘organic whole’ is a signal of Polybius’s methodology, which entails consolidation of antique happenings.
Hands
Polybius explains, “For it was after their victory over the Carthaginians in the Hannibalic War that the Romans came to believe that the principal and most important step in their effort to achieve universal dominion had been taken, and were thereby encouraged to stretch out their hands for the first time to grasp the rest, and to cross with an army into Greece and the lands of Asia.” The allegorical hands relate to the conquest which would amplify the Romans’ universal hegemony. A stretching of hands is equivalent to asserting political domination.
