Praesides, comites, duces. La Tripolitania e l’amministrazione dell’Africa tardoromana

This paper re-examines the administrative evolution of the province of Tripolitania from its creation under the tetrarchy to the latest evidence relating to Roman rule . The case of Tripolitania is , despite its inevitable specificity, emblematic; its study can be useful in order to explore, more generally, issues such as the way central government dealt with border districts in the later Roman empire, the problems of attribution of civil and military powers , the competition between the holders of such powers, and the possible interferences between the provincial authorities and the authorities operating at an interprovincial level . The author tries to make order in the scattered evidence related to Tripolitania and others north African provinces, which often has not been sufficiently explored or properly interpreted; new data obtained from a re-reading or re-assembling of some inscriptions from Sabratha and Leptis add further elements to the discussion. The evolution of Tripolitania is framed within the political and administrative history of north Africa: in fact , this specific case can not be properly understood without examining in parallel the interrelated evolutions of the other provinces and how they were affected by the reorganization by Diocletian , the establishment of the comitiva Africae, the introduction of frontier duces ... This paper also explores the network of relations between the various authorities in the province - the governor, the local elites , the individual cities and the provincial assembly – and the powers external to the province, from the vicars to the imperial court .