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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Libya
Index
A view of the ancient ruins at Germa in the Fezzan
Courtesy Keith Daber
For more than 400 years, Tripolitania and Cyrenaica were
prosperous Roman provinces and part of a cosmopolitan state whose
citizens shared a common language, legal system, and Roman
identity. Roman ruins like those of Leptis Magna, extant in
present-day Libya, attest to the vitality of the region, where
populous cities and even smaller towns enjoyed the amenities of
urban life--the forum, markets, public entertainments, and baths--
found in every corner of the Roman Empire. Merchants and artisans
from many parts of the Roman world established themselves in North
Africa, but the character of the cities of Tripolitania remained
decidedly Punic and, in Cyrenaica, Greek. Tripolitania was a major
exporter of olive oil, as well as being the entrepĂ´t for the gold
and slaves conveyed to the coast by the Garamentes, while Cyrenaica
remained an important source of wines, drugs, and horses. The bulk
of the population in the countryside consisted of Berber farmers,
who in the west were thoroughly "Punicized" in language and
customs.
Although the African provinces profited as much as any part of
the empire from the imposition of the Pax Romana, the region was
not without strife and threat of war. Only near the end of the
first century A.D. did the army complete the pacification of the
Sirtica, a desert refuge for the barbarian tribes that had impeded
overland communications between Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. But for
more than two centuries thereafter commerce flowed safely between
markets and ports along a well-maintained road system and sea lanes
policed by Roman forces who also guaranteed the security of settled
areas against incursions by desert nomads. The vast territory was
defended by one locally recruited legion (5,500 men) in Cyrenaica
and the elements of another in Tripolitania, reinforced by tribal
auxiliaries on the frontier. Although expeditions penetrated deep
into Fezzan, in general Rome sought to control only those areas in
the African provinces that were economically useful or could be
garrisoned with the manpower available.
Under the Ptolemies, Cyrenaica had become the home of a large
Jewish community, whose numbers were substantially increased by
tens of thousands of Jews deported there after the failure of the
rebellion against Roman rule in Palestine and the destruction of
Jerusalem in A.D. 70. Some of the refugees made their way into the
desert, where they became nomads and nurtured their fierce hatred
of Rome. They converted to Judaism many of the Berbers with whom
they mingled, and in some cases whole tribes were identified as
Jewish. In 115 the Jews raised a major revolt in Cyrenaica that
quickly spread through Egypt back to Palestine. The uprising was
put down by 118, but only after Jewish insurgents had laid waste to
Cyrenaica and sacked the city of Cyrene. Contemporary observers
counted the loss of life during those years at more than 200,000,
and at least a century was required to restore Cyrenaica to the
order and prosperity that had meanwhile prevailed in Tripolitania.
As part of his reorganization of the empire in 300, the Emperor
Diocletian separated the administration of Crete from Cyrenaica and
in the latter formed the new provinces of Upper Libya and Lower
Libya, using the term Libya for the first time as an
administrative designation. With the definitive partition of the
empire in 395, the Libyans were assigned to the eastern empire;
Tripolitania was attached to the western empire.
By the beginning of the second century, Christianity had been
introduced among the Jewish community, and it soon gained converts
in the towns and among slaves. Rome's African provinces were
thoroughly Christianized by the end of the fourth century, and
inroads had been made as well among the Berber tribes in the
hinterland. From an early date, however, the churches in
Tripolitania and Cyrenaica developed distinct characteristics that
reflected their differing cultural orientations. The former came
under the jurisdiction of the Latin patriarch, the bishop of Rome,
and the latter under that of the Coptic (Egyptian) patriarch of
Alexandria. In both areas, religious dissent became a vehicle for
social revolt at a time of political deterioration and economic
depression.
Invited to North Africa by a rebellious Roman official, the
Vandals, a Germanic tribe, crossed from Spain in 429. They seized
power and, under their leader, Gaiseric, established a kingdom that
made its capital at Carthage. Although the Roman Empire eventually
recognized their overlordship in much of North Africa, including
Tripolitania, the Vandals confined their rule to the most
economically profitable areas. There they constituted an isolated
warrior caste, concerned with collecting taxes and exploiting the
land but leaving civil administration in Roman hands. From their
African base they conquered Sardinia and Corsica and launched raids
on Italy, sacking the city of Rome in 455. In time, however, the
Vandals lost much of their warlike spirit, and their kingdom fell
to the armies of Belisarius, the Byzantine general who in 533 began
the reconquest of North Africa for the Roman Empire.
Effective Byzantine control in Tripolitania was restricted to
the coast, and even there the newly walled towns, strongholds,
fortified farms, and watchtowers called attention to its tenuous
nature. The region's prosperity had shrunk under Vandal domination,
and the old Roman political and social order, disrupted by the
Vandals, could not be restored. In outlying areas neglected by the
Vandals, the inhabitants had sought the protection of tribal
chieftains and, having grown accustomed to their autonomy, resisted
reassimilation into the imperial system. Cyrenaica, which had
remained an outpost of the Byzantine Empire during the Vandal
period, also took on the characteristics of an armed camp.
Unpopular Byzantine governors imposed burdensome taxation to meet
military costs, but towns and public services--including the water
system--were left to decay. Byzantine rule in Africa did prolong
the Roman ideal of imperial unity there for another century and a
half, however, and prevented the ascendancy of the Berber nomads in
the coastal region.
Data as of 1987
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