Limes Arabicus and Saracen Foederati: The Roman-Byzantine Desert Frontier in Late Antiquity

The question of the Roman-Byzantine desert frontier in Late Antiquity has attracted the attention of
various scholars in the past several decades. This frontier, known as the Limes Arabicus, spanned
more than 1,300 kilometers from northern Syria to southern Palestine and the edges of the Arabian
Peninsula. Recent research and excavations have done much to augment scholarly knowledge of
this frontier, which served as the south-eastern defense of the Roman Empire for over six centuries,
until it was eventually overrun by the Arab Muslim conquerors in the 630s. This frontier consisted
not onlynor even primarilyof fortifications and watchtowers, but also of major nomadic tribal
confederations, allied to Rome, which patrolled the desert and ensured the security of the eastern
provinces by exercising control over nomadic movements both within and, to a certain degree,
beyond the boundaries of the Roman Empire. Although much attention in recent years has been
devoted to the Ghassnids, which served as a major tribal confederation allied to Rome well into the
seventh century, the fourth century has been relatively less discussed.[1] Those scholars, including
Irfan Shahid, Greg Fisher and Glen Bowerstock, who have devoted their scholarship to
understanding this period have indicated its importance and have sought to underscore that the
fourth century witnessed both the rise of major Arab tribal confederations along the desert frontier
and the establishment of Roman foedus agreements, or alliances, with them.

As a critical presentation of modern historiography and a close reading of the primary literary
sources shows, three major trends emerge when considering the relationship between Rome and the
Arab tribes in the fourth century: 1) the military and political significance of the Arab tribal
confederations as a factor on Romes eastern frontier, 2) the increasing Christianization of the Arab
tribes of Sinai and Syria during this period as a result of the activities of ascetics and monks
dwelling in the desert, and 3) the increasing military, administrative, and cultural integration of the
Arabs into the Roman-Byzantine system in the Limes Arabicus. These three developments became

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increasingly interlinked during the late fourth century as Christianization became an important tool
for the integration of Arab tribes on the frontier into the Roman-Byzantine sphere of influence.

As Philip Mayerson has argued, the frontier was not merely a border separating Romans from
nomads, but rather a major zone of contact which included both defensive fortifications and thinly-
populated settlements between Palestine and the Euphrates River, thereby encompassing large areas
within the Roman provinces of Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Arabia.[2] Indeed, even the relationship
between the nomadic Arabs and the settled population (both the local population and the Roman
authorities) was quite complex, which ranged from symbiotic coexistence to violent raiding and
open warfare. The desert frontier should not, therefore, be thought of as a barrier of separation
between Romans and Arabs, or between pastoralists and settled peoples but as a zone which
offered the opportunity of peaceful interchange, and one which was occasionally subjected violent
incursions from groups of nomadic tribesmen in search of loot and slaves. Several scholars,
including Mayerson, have highlighted how the system of border fortifications and watchtowers
along the Limes Arabicus was strengthened during the era of the Emperor Diocletian (r. 284305),
who reorganized the desert frontier and reinforced its defensive infrastructure.

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As important as this line of defense, extending roughly from Damascus to southern Palestine,
may have been, scholars have emphasized how this nevertheless did not protect the eastern
provinces from the raids and depredations of the nomadic desert tribes.[3] Rather, many of these
fortresses and watchtowers served as an alert system and a means to provide safe refuge for the
inhabitants of these regions when such raids did in fact occur.[4] It is crucial to keep in mind that
Arab raids against the population centers of the eastern provinces were often immensely destructive
to property and often claimed a large number of people, who were either killed or carried off into
slavery, which led to the depopulation of significant regions in the provinces of Syria and Palestine.
[5] These raids were carried out by both Sassanid-allied Arabs, namely the Lakhmid/Nasrid
confederation, as well as more autonomous bands of raiders who dwelled along the Roman-
Byzantine desert frontier, and were not aimed at occupying or holding territory, but at securing
wealth (both loot and slaves).[6]
It was incredibly difficult for the Roman soldiers stationed along the desert frontiers to adequately
prevent raids by the nomads, especially since many of these tribesmen resided within Roman
imperial territory, which led to the adoption of a particular strategy in order to reinforce the
defenses in the east. [7] A key component of this strategy was, as already mentioned, the
infrastructure of watch-towers and fortresses which served to secure the lines of communication,
monitor the movement of the tribes and serve as places of refuge for the rural population of the
province, rather than as a comprehensive attempt to prevent Arab raids altogether, something which
was impossible given the extent of the frontier and the nature of the desert.[8] Mayerson
underscores that from the outset, the Romans recognized the futility of securing the desert frontier
from nomadic raids, and adapted accordingly. As such, at least as early as the fourth century, the
Romans began a process of integrating several Arab tribes from northern Arabia and Syria into their
defensive system by entering into agreements (foedus) with important tribal chiefs who would
ensure that order was maintained among those tribes under his (or, in some cases, her) authority
while preventing raids by those hostile nomads beyond the Roman frontier.[9]

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In this way, the Roman-allied nomadic tribes could serve as a buffer (or, defensive shield, as
some have termed it) between the eastern provinces and the hostile nomads beyond imperial
authority.[10] These semi-nomadic tribes were beneficial to the Romans because of their fighting
skills, well-adapted to desert warfare, as well as their mobility as light cavalry.[11] The title usually
conferred upon Arab chieftains operating under the auspices of Roman authority as foederati was
phylarch ().[12] There is much that remains unclear about the exact administrative
function or the authority of the phylarchs, but it appears that they were powerful or important
enough that they usually exercised a certain degree of control over nomadic tribes both within
Roman territory and across the desert frontier.[13] The famous Namra inscription (328 A.D.),
highlighted and studied by several scholars seems to provide an early indication of this arrangement
of Arab foederati operating along the desert frontier.[14] As the inscription suggests, the chieftain in
question (Imru al-Qays) was the head of a nomadic confederation acting on behalf of Rome on the
desert frontier, whose activities included (preventive?) warfare against the nomadic Arabs beyond
the boundaries of the Roman Empire.[15]

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It is significant that several scholars have emphasized that he had defected to Rome after having
served as an ally of the Sassanids, highlighting the gradual gravitation of certain Arab tribes into the
Roman sphere of influence.[16] Apparently the influence of Imru al-Qays was such that he could
claim to be the king of all the Arabs, which suggests that although he was a phylarch, bound by
treaty with Rome, he also exercised a form of independent authority in his own right over a large
number of nomadic tribes.[17] The foederati pact served not only a direct military-defensive
purpose but also brought many Arab tribes within the cultural and political orbit of Rome, a fact
made even more apparent by the adoption of Christianity by several Arab tribes.

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A major trend emphasized by modern scholarship has been the rise of powerful, nomadic (Arab)
confederations along the desert frontier in the fourth century.[18] Following the collapse of the
Nabataean and Palmyrene kingdoms, which witnessed the emergence of certain groups of Arabs as
an independent political force in the Near East during the second and third centuries, there was a
brief restoration of Roman authority along the Syro-Arabian frontier. However, by the early to mid-
fourth century, as evidenced in part by the Namra inscription, there appears to have been a rise of
new tribal confederations which filled the power vacuum caused by the fall of the Palmyrene
kingdom.[19]

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Although it is difficult to ascertain with any certainty, it has been argued that one of these tribal
confederations was that of the Tankhids which arose in the late third century and had entered into
an alliance with Rome by the early fourth century.[20] There have been suggestions that the rise of
these tribal confederations along Romes desert frontier were caused by a number of factors,
including the relative neglect of the south-eastern provinces of the empire due to the preoccupation
of imperial forces elsewhere in the Empire.[21] Regardless of the causes which facilitated the rise
of these new tribal confederations, which represented regional powers and posed a major strategic
and military threat to the eastern provinces, which were subjected to devastating raids and whose
populations were often carried off into slavery, once they did arise the Roman provincial and
imperial authorities were resolved to deal with them.[22] The rise of the Arab tribal confederations
was a factor which should be seen alongside the already-existing challenge of Persia and the threat
posed by its Arab allies. Thus, as Mayerson explains, circumstances compelled the Romans to use
other Saracens to counter those whom Persia employed. It is doubtful that they would have entered
into an alliance with a coalition of Arab tribes if they had had another option.[23]
It was in the face of these geo-political and strategic challenges that the foederati arrangement
became an important component of Roman defensive strategy as a means of both pacifying these
tribes and ensuring the security of the frontier by subcontracting the defense of the Limes
Arabicus to these nomadic confederations, which removed much of the pressure from the Roman
civil and military authorities while also relieving the sedentary population from the major raids
carried out by Persian-allied Arab tribes.[24] The relationship between Arab nomadic tribesmen and
Rome was constantly in flux, and it was complicated by a number of factors. Primarily, it was
unlikely that the tribal chieftain, or phylarch, could always restrain the tribes under his authority
from engaging in raids against the sedentary population, thereby undermining the effectiveness of
this defensive shield on Romes frontier.[25] Moreover, there was also the possibility that the
phylarch himself could break his allegiance with Rome for a variety of reasons, including
dissatisfaction with the authorities, which would leave the eastern provinces exposed to major
devastation, often by the very forces which were hitherto foederati on Romes behalf.[26]

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It is this fluidity of the relationship between Rome and its nomadic foederati, whereby the Arab
tribes could be on good terms with the Romans at one point, while becoming their worst enemies
the next which lay at the heart of Ammianus statement about how the Saracens were desirable
neither as friends nor foes.[27] It is also possible that this inability of Rome to secure the good-will
of the desert tribes, even those ostensibly allied with it, which may have contributed to the death of
the Emperor Julian in 363, although the specific circumstances remain unclear.[28] For their part,
the nomadic tribesmen benefited from the foederati arrangement by being granted material rewards
(food and money), as well as being extended noble dignities and titles which undoubtedly enhanced
their own standing in the eyes of their fellow nomadic Arabs.[29] Overall, it seems to be the case
that many scholars agree that the Arab confederations and tribesmen constituted a semi-autonomous
force, neither entirely outside nor inside the sphere of Roman authority.[30]

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Another question which has been raised by scholars relates to the degree of control exercised by
Rome over the nomadic Arab tribes allied to them through the foederati arrangement.[31] One key
point of contention has been whether the term phylarch should be interpreted as an official
Roman administrative title or merely an honorary designating the chieftain to whom Rome was
principally allied.[32] In this regard, it is important to highlight that there was a distinction which
was drawn between those Arabs (or Saracens) who served as units within the Roman military and
those who served as foederati on the desert frontier. As the Notitia Dignitatum indicates, there were
several active units of Saracen cavalry (favored for their mobility and military skills) within the
Roman military, stationed mainly in the provinces of Egypt, Arabia, Mesopotamia, and Phoenicia
around the year 400.[33] These were distinct (administratively and, possibly, culturally) from the
major Arab tribal confederations which were subsumed under the category of foederati and were
under the direct authority of the phylarch. Nevertheless, those units fighting within the Roman army
as well as the foederati all participated in the campaigns of the Empire on the eastern frontier
against the Persians, with the foederati playing a more active role in counter-balancing the Persian-
allied nomadic confederation of the Lakhmids.[34]

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The distinction between these two categories of Arab troops in imperial service serves to highlight
an additional point, namely that the frontier zone in the east was home to various populations of
Arabs. In the fourth century, populations of Saracens (the term employed by the literary sources)
were widely spread across the frontier and, for many, their homeland was located within the very
heart of the Roman provinces.[35] These communities were extremely varied and included
sedentary as well as nomadic groups, urban-based as well as rural inhabitants, and pagans as well as
Christians. In other words, it is quite important to keep in mind that the term Arab or Saracen
does not refer exclusively to the nomadic confederations, but encompasses a variety of populations
within the eastern provinces of Syria, Phoenicia, Arabia, and Mesopotamia. However, to be sure, it
was usually in their capacity as hostile raiders or allied foederati that most of the literary sources
concern themselves with the Saracens; the sedentary Arab population of Syria seldom attracted
the interest of the chroniclers.

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[1] The pioneering work of Irfan Shahid, especially his multi-volume Byzantium and the Arabs in
the Sixth Century (Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1995), in
particular, has done much to forward scholarly understanding of the Ghassnids. Another recent
work, namely Greg Fishers Between Empires: Arabs, Romans, and Sasanians in Late
Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), has provided a further contribution to the study
of the Arabs and the late Roman Empire in the sixth and seventh centuries, especially with reference
to the Ghassnids.
[2] Philip Mayerson, Saracens and Romans: Micro-Macro Relationships, Bulletin of the
American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 274 (1989), p. 71.
[3] Philip Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, in Monks, Martyrs, Soldiers, and Saracens:
Papers on the Near East in Late Antiquity (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1994), p. 39.
[4] S. Thomas Parker, Romans and Saracens: A History of the Arabian Frontier (Winona Lake, IN:
Eisenbrauns, 1986), p. 9; Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 39; Mayerson, Saracens and
Romans, p. 75.

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[5] Noel Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens in Late Antiquity (ca. 250630
C.E.), AnTard 19 (2011), pp. 244249; Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 73
[6] Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 72; Parker, Romans and Saracens, p. 144
[7] Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, pp. 36, 39; Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 75.
[8] Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 39; Noel Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the
Saracens in Late Antiquity (ca. 250630 C.E.), AnTard 19 (2011), pp. 255256.
[9] Warwick Ball. Rome in the East: Transformation of an Empire (London: Routledge, 2000), p.
96; Irfan Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs during the Reign of Constantine: The Namra
Inscription, An Arabic Monumentum Ancyranum, A.D. 328, Byzantinische Forschungen 26 (2000),
p. 78; Greg Fisher, A New Perspective on Romes Desert Frontier, Bulletin of the American
Schools of Oriental Research (2004), p. 54; Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, pp. 3536,
4344; Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 76
[10] Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 76
[11] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 96; Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 76; Fisher, A New
Perspective on Romes Desert Frontier, p. 55
[12] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 96; Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 43; Philip
Mayerson, The Use of the Term Phylarchos in the Roman-Byzantine East, Zeitschrift fr
Papyrologie und Epigraphik (1991), p. 291; Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens,
p. 241
[13] For a detailed discussion of the term phylarch, see Mayerson, The Use of the Term
Phylarchos, pp. 291295
[14] Irfan Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs in the Fourth Century (Washington D.C.: Dumbarton
Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1984), pp. 3152; J. Spencer Trimingham, Christianity
among the Arabs in Pre-Islamic Times (Beirut: Librairie du Liban, 1990), p. 93; Ariel S. Lewin,
Amr ibn Adi, Mavia, the Phylarchs and the Late Roman Army: Peace and War in the Near East,
in The Late Roman Army in the Near East from Diocletian to the Arab Conquest: Proceedings of a
Colloquium held at Potenza, Acerenza and Matera, Italy (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2007), eds. Ariel
S. Lewin and Pietrina Pellegrini, p. 245; Ball. Rome in the East, pp. 9798; Lenski, Captivity and
Slavery among the Saracens, p. 242; Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs during the Reign of
Constantine, p. 110.
[15] Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens, p. 242
[16] Noel Lenski, Failure of Empire: Valens and the Roman State in the Fourth Century
A.D. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), p. 201; Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs
during the Reign of Constantine, pp. 8891; Lewin, Amr ibn Adi, Mavia, the Phylarchs and the
Late Roman Army, p. 245; Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs in the Fourth Century, p. 52.
[17] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 98; Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens, p. 242;
Lenski, Failure of Empire, p. 202; Lewin, Amr ibn Adi, Mavia, the Phylarchs and the Late Roman
Army, p. 245.
[18] Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens, pp. 239240, 242
[19] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 97
[20] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 97; Lenski, Failure of Empire, p. 202. Ball argues that Imru al-Qays,
like Mavia, also belonged to the powerful Tankhid tribal confederation which arose on the
northern fringes of the Arabian Peninsula in the fourth century.
[21] Ball. Rome in the East, p. 97
[22] Lenski, Failure of Empire, p. 202
[23] Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 77
[24] Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 76; Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 43
[25] Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens, p. 257
[26] See, for example, the case of al-Numan in Mayerson, The Use of the Term Phylarchos, p.
293 n. 11
[27] Ammianus Marcellinus, History (Cambridge, Massachussets: Harvard University Press, 1958),
trans. John C. Rolfe, 14.4
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[28] Lenski, Failure of Empire, p. 203; Jan Rets, The Arabs in Antiquity: Their History from the
Assyrians to the Umayyads (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), p. 514
[29] Mayerson, Saracens and Romans, p. 77; Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 44;
Lenski, Captivity and Slavery among the Saracens, p. 264
[30] Lenski, Failure of Empire, p. 203
[31] Mayerson, The Use of the Term Phylarchos, p. 294
[32]Robert G. Hoyland, Arab Kings, Arab Tribes and the Beginnings of Arab Historical Memory
in Late Roman Epigraphy, in From Hellenism to Islam: Cultural and Linguistic Change in the
Roman Near East (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), ed. Hannah M. Cotton at al., p.
381; Mayerson, The Use of the Term Phylarchos, p. 291292
[33] David Woods, The Saracen Defenders of Constantinople in 378 Greek, Roman, and
Byzantine Studies 37: (1996), p. 271; Rets, The Arabs in Antiquity, p. 511; Mayerson, Saracens
and Romans, p. 76
[34] Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 43
[35] Mayerson, The Saracens and the Limes, p. 36

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