Richborough Castle fighting moved north, Rutupiae became an increasingly large civilian settlement. There were temples, an amphitheatre (visible as a hummock in the grass 5 minutes walk from the main site), and a "mansio" (first built in 100, it was a building that went through several phases, being a hotel for visiting officials, bath house and administration building). As a port, the town always competed with Portus Dubris (modern Dover), about south along the coast. However, Richborough was widely regarded throughout the Roman Empire for the quality of its oysters. They are mentioned as on a par with those from the Italian
Libya in the Roman era as a political state for the first time in history. After the final conquest and destruction of Carthage in 146 BC, northwestern Africa went under Roman rule and, shortly thereafter, the coastal area of what is now western Libya was established as a province under the name of Tripolitania with Leptis Magna capital and the major trading port in the region. In 96 BC Rome peacefully obtained Cyrenaica (left as inheritance by the king Ptolemy Apion) with the so-called sovereign "Pentapolis", formed by the cities of Cyrene (near the modern village of Shahat), its port of Apollonia, Arsinoe (Tocra), Berenice