Exarchat
The exarchat is an organization of certain peripheral territories of the Byzantine Empire, installation at the 6th century to face the threat of invaders. The exarchat is directed by “exarque” which concentrates the civil and military capacities.
The exarque name comes from the Greek exarchonis via the Latin exarchus . It is synonymous with governor, according to the verb exarchein , “to direct, control”. The exarque one was a senior official, delegated in a territory far away from the capital, holding simultaneously the capacities civilian and soldier, which were separate in the remainder of the empire.
This organization aimed at reacting in an optimal way to the dangers threatening the empire in its outlying areas, without having to await the orders come from Constantinople. They profited from a greater degree of independence than the other provincial governors.
Only two exarchats were made up, with Ravenne against the invasion of the Lombards, and with Carthage. The other provinces of the Byzantine empire accepted a similar organization gradually, but under the name of “topics”.
Exarques the civilians were true viceroys, to whom one entrusted the government of several provinces while exarques the ecclesiastics were delegates of the patriarch of Constantinople or the Holy synod, charged to visit the dioceses, and to supervise the discipline and manners of the clergy.
In the Churches of the East, a exarchat is the Western equivalent of a Primatie.
See too
- Exarchat de Ravenne
- Exarchat de Carthage
- Topic (Byzantine empire)
- Institutions of the Byzantine Empire
- Catépanat of Italy
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