Ranking Roman Provinces from Worst to Best

The Roman Empire at its peak encompassed provinces of about 5 million sq km

but not every province was like the other - some were rich, some poor, some recruited great

legionnaires while others were totally useless. Salve Mates, I hope everything is covered

in Tuscan sunshine at your end In today’s video I am going to be

ranking Roman provinces and regions from the worst to the best between the 1st and the 5th century.

This ranking of provinces will be based on 5 criteria – Economy, Emperors,

Recruitment, Defensiveness and Inclusion.

Now without further ado, let's get to number 18 - the worst-ranked Roman province.

Number 18 - Britannia. The last place is unsurprisingly Britannia. It was

a indeed worthless province for the Romans. Although it was almost a crown jewel at

the beginning of the Roman occupation due to its presence of gold, lead and copper mines,

those mines were depleted in the 3rd century. Since then Britain became a

burden Romans couldn’t easily shake off. Britannia always remained a semi-conquered

province. 3 to 4 legions were garrisoned on the island to defend it against Caledonians,

Franks and Saxons attacking from all cardinal points. Not even the immensely expensive

Hadrian’s Wall helped. That's why Britain gets 0 points out of 10 for defensiveness.

Inclusion wise, Britannia proved its worthlessness by launching an open

independence rebellion... twice. The first time they cofounded the separatist Gallic Empire,

then the Carausius revolt aka Britannic Empire. The population was also never fully Romanized.

Britannia had no Briton Emperors, although some were proclaimed Emperors by Britannic

legions, most notably Constantine so there's at least one point for that.

So all in all this is the reason why Britannia is last on the list with just 8 points in total.

Number 17 - Dacia. Province Dacia was in a good position to become one of the most

useful Roman provinces, it had surprisingly successful Romanization, 2 Roman emperors

were Dacians – Galerius and Licinius but the existence of the province was short-lived.

Dacia was a good recruitment province, unfortunately, it ended up being a second

Britannia because Dacia wasn’t fully conquered, the border between the Roman Empire and the

barbaric lands stretched longer because of Dacia’s presence, with its northern, eastern,

and western frontiers exposed to attacks. Even Hadrian contemplated withdrawing from

Dacia’s only after like 10 years after it had been conquered because of how much burden he saw in it.

In terms of Military, 2 to 3 legions were needed to defend it but luckily for Rome, Dacia was soon

abandoned in 272 without any major repercussions on the stability of the Roman Empire.

In terms of Economy: The Dacians cultivated cereals, fruit trees, wheat and vines.

They also raised large herds of cattle and sheep and were known for beekeeping.

Overall Dacia was a poor province, although it had a lot of gold mines in the 1st century but

those ran out soon as well. It's a shame but Dacia gets only 14 points overall,

with the defensiveness being its Achilles heel.

Obelix: It is Mr. XVI

Asterix: No it is a number, its 16.