Note 198 — Chapter XII · EGYPT.

This exclusion of the joint rule of the senate as of the senators is indicated by Tacitus (Hist. i. 11) with the words that Augustus wished to have Egypt administered exclusively by his personal servants (domi retinere; comp. Staatsrecht, ii. p. 963). In principle this abnormal form of government was applicable for all the provinces not administered by senators, the presidents of which were also at the outset called chiefly praefecti (C. I. L. v. p. 809, 902). But at the first division of the provinces between emperor and senate there was probably no other of these but just Egypt; and subsequently the distinction here came into sharper prominence, in so far as all the other provinces of this category obtained no legions. For in the emergence of the equestrian commandants of the legion instead of the senatorial, as was the rule in Egypt, the exclusion of the senatorial government finds its most palpable expression.