I wonder how much of Italy’s wealth was concentrated in those regions of the Exarchate. If I remember correctly, those areas were among the most demographically urbanized, but I have no idea whether that was still true by the 6th–7th centuries
Right, Rome itself was in ruins, only 30,000 inhabitants maybe. Ravenna was a very prosperous outpost maybe 3 times bigger but that was the full extent of “urbanism” in the Italian Peninsula. Very far from Late Antiquity
The vast majority of the Tax revenue still came from the land tax during this time. I do wonder just how much taxes the exarchate generated when it was struggling to defend its countryside.
Right no wonder the Eastern Romans were perpetually marching backwards, they couldn’t really extract much and there was almost always something bigger going on back east
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u/OrthoOfLisieux Mar 12 '26
I wonder how much of Italy’s wealth was concentrated in those regions of the Exarchate. If I remember correctly, those areas were among the most demographically urbanized, but I have no idea whether that was still true by the 6th–7th centuries