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Libya
Libya and the Romans
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 entrepôt
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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