Eli5 How did ancient and medieval borders work?
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You had clear borders at key points (river crossings, coasts and so on) and zones of influence and control. So ‘this town and its territory belong to the Kingdom of France” means French officials, or oaths in the king’s name and sermons calling for long life to the king, and maybe some checks at the town gate. Villages around follow suit, but exactly where the town’s territory ends is not clear – it fades into wood or marsh or mountain or just some patch too poor to bother with.
The maps showing Roman borders following the Rhine and Danube are misleading. Rome had outposts on the other side, regularly policed adjacent lands, took tribute and demanded safe passage for their merchants. Then, as power shifted, the ‘Roman’ side became less safe away from the major centres, and barbarians settled in. Again, a zone of control and then a zone of influence.
In modern times, up to 1946 the British Indian Raj ruled what is now Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province. The rules were: no raiding outside the Province; no fighting on the major roads or in the big towns; no molesting subjects of the Raj; hand over anyone wanted. Enforced by garrisons, patrols and visits by political agents (“Now, Mohamed, your nephew has been very naughty. He can hand himself in, or I can have the 5th Gurkha Rifles turn over the district. Which is it to be?”). So the ‘border’ was an overlying web of lines and dots reaching out from the core area.
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