Germania Inferior

The lower Rhine command, where the frontier met the sea and where Rome lost an army it never replaced. Inferior meant downstream: the province ran from the Vinxtbach to the North Sea, covering the southern Netherlands, part of Belgium and the German Rhineland, with Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium - modern Cologne, which carries the word colony in its name - as capital. The territory was the base for the attempt to conquer Germany that ended in 9 with the destruction of three legions under Varus in the Teutoburg Forest, after which Augustus abandoned expansion east of the Rhine and the lost legion numbers were never reused. The province proper was organised around 85. It held two legions and the Rhine fleet, and its lower reaches were wet, dyke-managed country farmed by the Batavi, who supplied the empire's best auxiliary cavalry and were exempt from tax in exchange for soldiers. That arrangement broke down in 69, when Julius Civilis led a revolt that destroyed Roman positions along the whole lower Rhine before being put down. Xanten and Nijmegen grew from legionary bases. The province exported pottery, glass and salt. Frankish groups settled inside the frontier from the third century. The Roman military road along the Rhine still underlies modern routes. Cologne is now the fourth largest city in Germany. The province was renamed Germania Secunda under Diocletian. Its fleet patrolled the Rhine delta and the North Sea coast. Batavian auxiliaries served as the imperial bodyguard in Rome. The Roman harbour works at Velsen and Voorburg have been excavated in the Netherlands.

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