A city's Pomerium

[lothia]

Ave Civitas,

I understand that some cities had a Pomerium and it extended beyond the original city walls.
I believe that Rome was not the only city with a pomerium.

I am imagining the ciy limits and the pomerium limits to be similar to the German Stadtkreis and Landkreis.
My question is:

If some cities had the pomerium, was there a restriction on which cities had them?
How far beyond the city  proper would the pomeriuim extend?
I assume that there were unincorporated lands between one city's pomerium and another city's pomerium?

Then I know there were imperial lands controlled by bureaus in the capitols.  but what about the unincorporated lands that did not fall under the city or the emperor.  They must have fallen under someone's jurisdiction.  Would that be the provincial governor's authority that encompassed the unincorporated lands or were there smaller governmental offices within the province?


Thank you all in advance
Tom

[caldrail]

The Pomerium was a religious area traditionally said to be contained within the original boundaries made by Romulus at the founding of the city. There was no wall, just markers to show where it extended. I'm not aware of any Pomerium attached to other cities because although the Romans rewarded emulation of Roman society, there was only one Romulus. There were laws governing the Pomerium but I don't know of anyone who directly controlled it (Surely this would be against tradition in Republican Rome?), For instance, holders of imperium (basically a license to control and lead armies) did not have full power within the Pomerium, nor were weapons allowed within it. Soldiers would not appear in military guise within the boundaries for fear of losing their status as legionaries because they transgressed the law.

[lothia]

Thank you for your reply.

Perhaps pomerium was not the right word and it belongs only to the city of Rome.  But it seems reasonable that the others cities would have (or want to have) some administrative or pecuniary control or influence on the areas surrounding a city.

Again, thanks for your response.

[caldrail]

Settlements in the Roman Empire were rewarded for emulation of Rome, by tax breaks, concessions, or whatever. Sometimes a settlement would be awarded a higher status. At a certain level, a settlement could create its own Senate, but this was rarely achieved outside of Italy (whose partially independent tribal regions all had traditional rights to self rule, despite subsequent incorporation by the Empire)

[lothia]

On 6/29/2019 at 5:16 AM, caldrail said:

Settlements in the Roman Empire were rewarded for emulation of Rome, by tax breaks, concessions, or whatever. Sometimes a settlement would be awarded a higher status. At a certain level, a settlement could create its own Senate, but this was rarely achieved outside of Italy (whose partially independent tribal regions all had traditional rights to self rule, despite subsequent incorporation by the Empire)

When you  write senate, you are not referring to the duoviri, right?  Every city had their own government, or do I misunderstand?

[caldrail]

A settlement that reached a certain status (I'm not sure which, but I'm assuming it was civitas) was allowed a local senate to conduct admin/government - remember that the empire was not centrally governed nor was it territorial in nature, but focused on settlements.. Although Rome had the final word as it were, provinces were governed internally on local/regional matters. Governors were not ruling the province per se, but represented the final word in both Roman and native law, and generally did little governing other than to exploit the region for personal profit - note the Roman policy of assimilating local rulers to plug into the Roman network to exploit the existing chains of loyalty.

Edited July 23, 2019 by caldrail