Rome ruled Egypt for nearly seven centuries as the emperor's private breadbasket
After Cleopatra and Mark Antony died in 30 BC, Octavian treated Egypt as his own possession. For almost 700 years it fed the empire with grain and was its richest province outside Italy. Senators were kept out of its government, and the emperors styled themselves as pharaohs to their Egyptian subjects.
Cleopatra VII had backed Julius Caesar and then Mark Antony. Once Octavian won at Actium and took Alexandria, the Ptolemaic kingdom that had ruled since Alexander's conquests was finished. When Octavian became Augustus in 27 BC, Egypt was made an imperial province. The Ptolemaic system was dismantled, private landownership widened, and local landowners were obliged to serve in local government, though Egyptian temples and priests kept most of their privileges and joined the cult of the deified emperors.
The province was run differently from the rest of the empire. Its governor, the prefect of Alexandria and Egypt, came from the equestrian order rather than the Senate, and held powers comparable to a proconsul, commanding the legions, overseeing taxes and the vital grain shipments, and acting as supreme judge. The post paid 200,000 sesterces a year and ranked second among equestrian offices, behind only the commander of the Praetorian Guard. Three legions garrisoned Egypt at first, cut to two under Tiberius. The prefect toured the country holding assizes, and more than 60 of these governors' edicts are known.
Alexandria was the empire's biggest port and its second city. Estimates of the total population range from 4 to 8 million, most of them village farmers speaking Egyptian, while the towns ran on Greek language and culture. Literacy was high, and in AD 212 all free Egyptians received Roman citizenship. Queen Zenobia of Palmyra seized Egypt in 269 until Aurelian won it back, and Diocletian later reformed the administration and pulled the southern frontier back to Aswan.
Christianity spread under Constantine, who took Egypt in 324 and introduced the gold solidus, and Coptic grew out of older Egyptian among the faithful. The Justinianic Plague first appeared at Pelusium in 541. Persia held Egypt for a decade from 618, and in 642 it passed to the Rashidun Caliphate, ending Roman rule.
Source: Roman Egypt
