Polybius

In this course

Polybius appears in this course primarily as a historical figure whose role as captive witness to the Punic Wars and the fall of Carthage—documented in his Histories—establishes a template for embedded observation of world-altering technological and political events. The readings invoke him to explore how firsthand accounts of catastrophic systems collapse (ancient military, contemporary cyber-warfare) become foundational historical documents, and how the act of witnessing and recording from within a compromised position shapes our understanding of power and destruction. His invocation alongside Nitro Zeus and discussions of memesis suggests an interest in how testimony itself becomes a kind of technology for encoding and transmitting knowledge about violence and systemic failure.

Mentioned in 1 reading