1

Administration, Roman
Egypt
THOMAS KRUSE

The administration of Egypt after the Roman

conquest in 30 BCE developed in two opposing
directions: the continuity of administrative
institutions of the former Ptolemaic kingdom
on the one hand, and the introduction of
new elements by the Romans on the other.
One should keep in mind, however, that in
contrast to a thesis uttered for the first time
by Theodor Mommsen, and thereafter quite
influential among a great part of scholars in
the past, there was no continuity between the
Ptolemaic and the Roman rule over Egypt; that
is to say, the Roman princeps by no means
assumed the kingship of the Ptolemies, and
his governor (the praefectus Aegypti) was not
a viceroy (such as the governor of British
India) who allegedly governed the country
as a sort of crown domain. In fact, the analysis
of the numerous documentary papyri dating
from the Roman principate confirm a statement of the geographer Strabo (17.1.12 [797],
a contemporary of Augustus) that after its
conquest by the first Roman princeps Egypt
became an eparcheia in other words, it was
a Roman provincia like any other Roman province, and it did not possess any exceptional
legal status.
Elements of continuity can be found, first, at
the lower levels of the administrative hierarchy
among the institutions of the local administration in the Egyptian chora. The Romans left
intact the ancient (and actually pre-Ptolemaic)
administrative division of the country with the
NOME (Greek nomos) as its basic unit, administered by authorities who resided in the nome
capital (metropolis) with the nome-strategos
(strategos tou nomou) as the head of the nome
administration. In the long run, of course, this
administrative structure evolved through the
process of municipalization initiated by
the Romans, which aimed at strengthening
the administrative role of the nome capitals.

It first established municipal honorary

offices (archai) in these towns (like the
gymnasiarchos), and thereby created a local
urban elite from which the new town councils
(boulai) in the nome capitals were recruited
from around 200 CE, after the emperor
Septimius Severus had granted the nome capitals the privilege of town councils. Thereafter
the boulai assumed an increasing level of
responsibility in the local administration.
The nome strategoi were recruited from the
indigenous Greek-speaking elite of the country
and were, as in the Ptolemaic period, placed
above the lower administrative officials in the
nome metropolis and in the territory of the
nome, which was subdivided into toparchies
(headed by a topogrammateus) and villagedistricts (komogrammateiai), each of them
administered by a komogrammateus.
More significant were the changes at the
level of the central administration of the province. When Egypt was first integrated into the
Roman Empire, Augustus preferred to entrust
its administration to members of the equestrian order, which he had reorganized and
whose members solely depended on him,
with no interference from the Roman Senate.
This solution was also meant to prevent a
potential senatorial rival of the emperor from
using the wealthy province as a base from
which he could conquer the throne. Although
this never materialized, the administration of
the country by Roman knights proved successful, and was therefore maintained by the
succeeding emperors.
At the head of the countrys administration
stood the governor of Egypt, called prefect of
Alexandria and Egypt (praefectus Alexandriae
et Aegypti). After the praetorian prefecture, this
was the highest office a Roman knight could
reach, and a special law granted him powers
equal to those of a governor of senatorial rank
(Ulp. Dig. 1.17,1). In Greek his title was
eparchos Aigyptou, but in most of our documents he is simply called hegemon. He resided
in Alexandria, as did the chiefs of the
other departments of the provinces central

The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, First Edition. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall, Kai Brodersen, Craige B. Champion, Andrew Erskine,
and Sabine R. Huebner, print pages 9598.
2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2013 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah07003

2
Prefect
(praefectus Aegypti/
eparchos Aigyptou)

Iuridicus
Legal adviser

Chief Priest
Admin. of
temples

Dioiketes
Finance officer

Idios Logos
I/C 'Private
Account'

Procurators
Financial admin.

Military
Commanders

Epistrategoi
4 regional
administrators
Roman equestrian officials,
appointed by the emperor.

Accountant of nome
(eklogistes)
residing with and
responsible to central
administration

Greco-Egyptians,
appointed by the prefect.

Strategos
Admin. of nome

Local executive magistrates,

'elected' or co-opted.
Local officials appointed to
compulsory public services.

Scribes of the nome

metropoleis
[grammateis (metro)poleos]

Royal Scribe
(basilikos grammateus)
Secretary of nome,
deputy strategos

District Scribe
(topogrammateus)
Village Scribe
(komogrammateus)

Magistrates and Town

Councillors
(from 201 CE)

Village Elders
(presbyteroi)

Liturgists

Liturgists

Figure 1 The administrative system of Roman Egypt.

administration, all of them Roman knights of

procuratorial rank. The financial administration was headed by the dioiketes (procurator ad
dioikesin) in charge of the regular government
revenue (state-land, taxes, customs-duties, and
other such taxes); the Idios Logos (thus called
because the office developed out of a special
account) oversaw irregular state income, like
confiscations or fines. Both administrative
posts were already in existence under the
Ptolemies. A new office in the financial administration was that of the procurator usiacus who
administered the ousiakos logos, a specific
branch of the provincial fiscus which incorporated the former private estates of members of
the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and their freedmen; those estates had been confiscated by
the Flavians after 69 CE.

The iuridius was responsible for the administration of justice and legal issues. The High
Priest (archiereus) of Alexandria and all Egypt
was another new official introduced by the
Romans. He had control over the Egyptian
temples and their priests, who were subjected
to strict supervision by the government in
the imperial period. In spite of his title, his
role was obviously more administrative than
religious. Other procuratorial offices existed
for the administration of the big granaries in
Alexandria, where the grain destined for the
supply of Rome, Italy, and the Roman army
was stored.
Apart from being the head of the civil
administration of the province, the prefect
was also the commander in chief of the troops
in the country. These were the Roman legions

3
garrisoned near Alexandria, the auxiliary
forces stationed all over the country, and the
provincial fleet (classis Alexandrina).
An extensive lower level administrative staff
was attached to the office of the prefect.
The most important of these were the eklogistai
(accountants). Each one was responsible for
a single nome, and had to review its accounts
on taxes and revenues, check the actions of its
administrative officials, and report on these
matters to the prefect.
Between the provincial and local administration there were the three to four epistrategoi in
charge of Lower Egypt, the Heptanomia (Middle Egypt), and the Thebais. Their position in
the administrative chain of command is still
unclear, but it is fairly certain that they did not
constitute any sort of a regular middle administrative instance between the Alexandrian
offices and those of the nome administration;
the prefect and the heads of the other central
offices corresponded directly with the nome
strategoi, and not through the epistrategoi.
The prefects primary duty was to take care of
the regular flow of taxes and grain out of the
province into the Roman treasury, because
the supply of the people of Rome and a great
part of the Roman army in the east depended
on Egyptian grain. Furthermore he, like any
other Roman governor, was responsible for
maintaining law and order in his province. To
this effect, he acted as chief-judge, who could (as
the papyri show very clearly) be petitioned by
any person who considered himself/herself to be
wronged. He also controlled the actions of the
officials at the lower administrative levels, mainly
to prevent any unlawful extortion of taxes from
the provinces inhabitants, which is a major
theme of several prefectural edicts and decrees.
To this end, he held a conventus (dialogismos)
every year in the course of which he visited
various parts of the country, presiding over
a court where plaintiffs and defendants summoned by him had to appear, together with
local officials.

SEE ALSO: Administration, Ptolemaic Egypt;

Prefect of Egypt; Strategos, Egypt.

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