Gaius Julius Polybius (fl. 1st century ) was a

freedman A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom ...

of Emperor

Claudius Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (; 1 August 10 BC – 13 October AD 54) was the fourth Roman emperor, ruling from AD 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, Claudius was born to Drusus and Antonia Minor ...

who was elevated to the secretariat during his reign. He assisted Claudius in his literary, judicial and historical pursuits as a researcher before the emperor's accession and this became Polybius' official role in the imperial bureaucracy, with the title a studiis.

Suetonius Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (), commonly referred to as Suetonius ( ; c. AD 69 – after AD 122), was a Roman historian who wrote during the early Imperial era The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τ� ...

, the biographer and secretary to the

Emperor Hadrian Hadrian (; la, Caesar Trâiānus Hadriānus ; 24 January 76 – 10 July 138) was Roman emperor from 117 to 138. He was born in Italica (close to modern Santiponce in Spain), a Roman ''municipium'' founded by Italic settlers in Hispania ...

, claims that Claudius was so appreciative of his help that Polybius was allowed to walk between the

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throu ...

s when on official business. When Polybius lost a brother in the early 40s CE,

Seneca the Younger Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (; 65 AD), usually known mononymously as Seneca, was a Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, dramatist, and, in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature. Seneca was born ...

, (who was then in exile,) wrote his famous ''Ad Polybium'' in response. The intent seems to have been to gain Polybius' support for Seneca's recall to Rome. In the work, Polybius is praised for his loyalty to Claudius, but is also admonished that service to an emperor must come before grief. It had no effect on the freedman and Seneca remained in exile. Disloyalty led Polybius to his downfall. He was executed for crimes against the state, supporting the view that freedmen were still in a position inferior to emperor, whatever their influence. Ancient historians claimed that Empress

Messalina Valeria Messalina (; ) was the third wife of Roman emperor Claudius. She was a paternal cousin of Emperor Nero, a second cousin of Emperor Caligula, and a great-grandniece of Emperor Augustus. A powerful and influential woman with a reputation ...

arranged for his death when she tired of him as a lover.

Cassius Dio Lucius Cassius Dio (), also known as Dio Cassius ( ), was a Roman historian and senator of maternal Greek origin. He published 80 volumes of the history on ancient Rome, beginning with the arrival of Aeneas in Italy. The volumes documented the ...

60,31,2. He was probably the father of a prominent politician Caius Julius Polybius, whose house was found in

Pompeii Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune'' of Pompei near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area (e.g. at Boscoreale, Stabiae), was burie ...

References

Further reading