AfricaArticle Free Pass Africa, in ancient Roman history, the
first North African territory of Rome, at times roughly
corresponding to modern Tunisia. It was acquired in 146 bc after
the destruction of Carthage at the end of the Third Punic War.
Initially, the province comprised the territory that had been
subject to Carthage in 149 bc; this was an area of about 5,000
square miles (13,000 square km), divided from the kingdom of
Numidia in the west by a ditch and embankment running southeast
from Thabraca (modern Ṭabarqah) to Thaenae (modern Thīnah).
About 100 bc the province’s boundary was extended farther
westward, almost as far as the present Algerian-Tunisian border.
The province grew in importance during the 1st century bc, when
Julius Caesar and, later, the emperor Augustus founded a total
of 19 colonies in it. Most notable among these was the new
Carthage, which the Romans called Colonia Julia Carthago; it
rapidly became the second city in the Western Roman Empire.
Augustus extended Africa’s borders sou