Exarchate of Ravenna

  General Description   We begin our Exarchate of Ravenna polity in 568 CE, the date of the last praetorian prefect in Italy, although the first ’exarch’ (essentially a governor with political and military authority) known by name dates to the last decades of the 6th century. ^[1] This year saw Lombard and Germanic tribes invade northern Italy, expelling the Byzantine influence in the area which the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (r. 527-565 CE) had established only about a decade earlier. The Exarchate of Ravenna together with most of central Italy and parts of the south were the only parts of the former Ostrogothic Kingdom to remain under Byzantine authority after this time. Shortly afterwards, perhaps around 575 CE or slightly later, the first exarch of Ravenna was created under the aegis of the Byzantine emperor. ^[2] The Exarchate period ended when the last exarch, Eutychius, was killed during the Lombard conquest of the territory in 751 CE. However, recognition of the nominal Byzantine authority in the region persisted until 781 CE, when the years of the emperor’s reign were no longer used for dating papal documents or on the coins minted in Rome. ^[3]
Population and political organization
The Exarchate of Ravenna was essentially a special province of the East Roman Empire and the exarch owed nominal allegiance to the emperor in Constantinople. The Roman Senate was last known operating in 580 CE ^[4] and many of the senators moved to Constantinople ’to maintain access to court appointments’. ^[4] In Italy, Ravenna was the undisputed home and capital for the army and civil administration. ^[5]
The exarch was a ruler who combined civil and military powers, ^[6] commanding over 50,000 square kilometres of land in Italy after a period of protracted warfare had destroyed the Roman-friendly Ostrogothic governmental system. ^[4] His duties included leading the army in Italy, publishing and enforcing laws and canons of church councils, and appointing most subordinate officials. ^[1] Exarchs were appointed by the East Roman Emperor from among the personnel of his palace administration in Constantinople ’and rarely had served in any capacity in Italy before being named exarch’. ^[1] The criteria for choosing exarchs is not entirely clear, nor is it certain how long they might have expected their official tenure to last. ^[6] What is clear is that the exarch retained a great deal of authority and autonomy in the region.
Under the exarch, dukes of provinces ruled from cities (e.g. Rome, Naples, Rimini, Venice) and tribunes governed in towns. Like the exarch himself, the role of dukes and tribunes combined both military and civic duties. However, these men, ’along with the lower-level officers and troops, administrators, clerks, and tax collectors were drawn primarily from the local population, including educated laymen, although on occasion an official might be sent from Constantinople’. ^[7] Ravenna was governed both directly by the exarchal administration ^[7] and, until the mid-7th century, a city council (curia) responsible for tax collection and certifying and storing legal documents. ^[8] Decentralization from 600 to 750 CE weakened the authority of the exarch, ^[9] and as government collapsed, the dukes in the provinces gained power. ^[10] The 7th century CE saw the development of an ’increasingly closed and hereditary land and officeholding aristocracy’. ^[11]
Another important rival of the exarch’s authority was the archbishop of Ravenna. The exarch worked with the archbishop of Ravenna ’in legal cases, foreign affairs, papal relations, and other similar sorts of situations’, ^[12] but sometimes they clashed on ’doctrinal matters’. ^[13] The Church also financed public works projects, such as building churches and public baths. ^[14]
Italy experienced a slight population expansion during this period, and had perhaps over one million inhabitants. ^[15]

[1]: (Noble 1984, 4) Thomas F. X. Noble. 1984. The Republic of St. Peter: The Birth of the Papal State, 680-825. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

[2]: (Nicol 1988, 5) Donald M. Nicol. 1988. Byzantium and Venice: A Study in Diplomatic and Cultural Relations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[3]: (Grierson and Blackburn 2007, 259) P. Grierson and M. Blackburn. 2007. Medieval European Coinage, Volume 1: The Early Middle Ages (5th-10th Centuries). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[4]: (Deliyannis 2010, 207) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[5]: (Deliyannis 2010, 207-10) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[6]: (Deliyannis 2010, 208) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[7]: (Deliyannis 2010, 286-87) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[8]: (Deliyannis 2010, 208, 286-87) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[9]: (Deliyannis 2010, 278) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[10]: (Deliyannis 2010, 287) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[11]: (Noble 1984, 7) Thomas F. X. Noble. 1984. The Republic of St. Peter: The Birth of the Papal State, 680-825. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

[12]: (Deliyannis 2010, 210, 287) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[13]: (Brown 1979, 26) T. S. Brown. 1979. ’The Church of Ravenna and the Imperial Administration in the Seventh Century’. The English Historical Review 94 (370): 1-28.

[14]: (Deliyannis 2010, 201) Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis. 2010. Ravenna in Late Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[15]: (Noble 1984, 8) Thomas F. X. Noble. 1984. The Republic of St. Peter: The Birth of the Papal State, 680-825. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.