The period of Byzantine control (mid 6th - mid 7th century) over the coastal region of Liguria, was a crucial one in the definition of a new Mediterranean asset. For many parts of the western Mediterranean world this was the definitive passage from Antiquity into the Early Middle Ages and Liguria was no exception. After several decades of new archaeological investigations in the area not corroborated by a synthesis with a wider Mediterranean contextualisation, my PhD project aims to consider the new data in order to re-evaluates the characteristics of a Byzantine province focussing mostly on archaeological data combined with a new examination of the textual evidence, in order to generate a model of 'survival and adaptation' in a frontier context. The Ligurian context can provide an early example for the developing factors that affected the Byzantine westernmost provinces during the early stages of the Middle Ages. The final aim is to explore Constantinople's policy and legacy with these provinces, usually perceived as very distant from the core areas of the Empire, not fully integrated and relegated in a part of the Mediterranean where Byzantine influence has always been considered weak. Was Constantinople's influence on these areas so minor as to only marginally impact their journey into the Early Middle Ages or the Byzantine presence was strong enough to leave a mark?