p. 692 | The Roman Empire by A. T. Jones

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 19, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 44.

The Roman Empire.

By A. T. Jones

(Concluded.)

THE ROMAN PROVINCES.

THE boundaries of Italy were the same as they now are, and were divided by Augustus into eleven regions.

"The European provinces of Rome were protected by the course of the Rhine and the Danube. The latter of those mighty streams, which rises at the distance of only thirty miles from the former, flows about thirteen hundred miles, for the most part to the southeast, collects the tribute of sixty navigable rivers, and is, at length, through six mouths, received into the Euxine [Black Sea], which appears scarcely equal to such an accession of waters. The provinces of the Danube soon acquired the general appellation of Illyricum, or the Illyrian frontier, and were esteemed the most warlike of the empire; but they deserve to be more particularly considered under the names of Rhætia, Noricum, Pannonia, Dalmatia, Dacia, Mæsia, Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece.

"The province of Rhætia, which soon extinguished the name of the Vindelicians, extended from the summit of the Alps to the banks of the Danube, from its source, as far as its conflux with the Inn. . . .

"The wide extent of territory which is included between the Inn, the Danube, and the Save,—Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, the Lower Hungary, and Sclavonia,—was known to the ancients under the names of Noricum and Pannonia. In their original state of independence, their fierce inhabitants were intimately connected. Under the Roman Government they were frequently united, and they still remain the patrimony of a single family. . . . It may not be improper to observe, that if we except Bohemia, Moravia, the northern skirts of Austria, and a part of Hungary, between the Teyss and the Danube, all the other dominions of the House of Austria were comprised within the limits of the Roman Empire.

"Dalmatia, to which the name of Illyricum more properly belonged, was a long, but narrow tract, between the Save and the Adriatic. . . .

"After the Danube had received the waters of the Teyss and the Save, it acquired, at least among the Greeks, the name of Ister. It formerly divided Mæsia and Dacia, the latter of which, as we have already seen, was a conquest of Trajan, and the only province beyond the river. If we inquire into the present state of those countries, we shall find that, on the left hand of the Danube, Temeswar and Transylvania have been annexed, after many revolutions, to the crown of Hungary; whilst the principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia acknowledge the supremacy of the Ottoman Porte. On the right bank of the Danube, Mæsia, which, during the Middle Ages, was broken into the barbarian kingdoms of Servia and Bulgaria, is again united in Turkish slavery.

"The appellation of Roumelia, which is still bestowed by the Turks on the extensive countries of Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece, preserves the memory of their ancient state under the Roman Empire. In the time of the Antonines, the martial regions of Thrace, from the mountains of Hæmus and Rhodope to the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, had assumed the form of a province. . . . The kingdom of Macedonia, which, under the reign of Alexander, gave laws to Asia, derived more solid advantages from the policy of the two Philips; and with its dependencies of Epirus and Thessaly, extended from the Ægean to the Ionian Sea. When we reflect on the fame of Thebes and Argos, of Sparta and Athens, we can scarcely persuade ourselves that so many immortal republics of ancient Greece were lost in a single province of the Roman Empire, which, from the superior influence of the Achaean league, was usually denominated the province of Achaia.

"Such was the state of Europe under the Roman emperors. . . . From Cyrene [the twentieth degree east longitude] to the ocean, the coast of Africa extends above fifteen hundred miles; yet so closely is it pressed between the Mediterranean and the Sahara, or sandy desert, that its breadth seldom exceeds four-score or a hundred miles. The eastern division was considered by the Romans as the more peculiar and proper province of Africa. Till the arrival of the Phœnician colonies, that fertile country was inhabited by the Libyans, the most savage of mankind. Under the immediate jurisdiction of Carthage, it became the center of commerce and empire; but the republic of Carthage is now degenerated into the feeble and disorderly States of Tripoli and Tunis.

"The military government of Algiers oppresses the wide extent of Numidia, as it was once united under Massinissa and Jugurtha; but in the time of Augustus, the limits of Numidia were contracted; and at least two-thirds of the country acquiesced in the name of Mauritania, with the epithet of Cæsariensis. The genuine Mauritania, or country of the Moors, which, from the ancient city of Tingi, or Tangier, was distinguished by the appellation of Tingitana, is represented by the modern kingdom of Fez. Salle, on the ocean, long infamous for its piratical depredations, was noticed by the Romans as the extreme object of their power, and almost of their geography. A city of their foundation may still be discovered near Mequinez, the residence of the barbarian whom we condescend to style the emperor of Morocco; but it does not appear that his more southern dominions, Morocco itself and Segelmessa, were ever comprehended within the Roman province. . . .

"We may observe, that Africa is divided from Spain by a narrow strait of about twelve miles, through which the Atlantic flows into the Mediterranean. The columns of Hercules, so famous among the ancients, were two mountains which seemed to have been torn asunder by some convulsion of the elements; and at the foot of the European mountain the fortress of Gibraltar is now seated. The whole extent of the Mediterranean Sea, its coasts, and its islands, were comprised within the Roman dominion."—Decline and Fall, chap. 1, par. 28-33, 37, 38. See also Ginn and Heath's Classical Atlas, Map 12.

Of these provinces, Pannonia and all westward, and those named on the African coast, formed the territory proper of the fourth kingdom,—Rome. These, with the northwestern part of Illyricum, formed what is known in history as the Latin or Western Empire of Rome. And it is within the boundaries of the Western Empire that the ten kingdoms should be established.