I was looking at a map similar to this in history class: http://www.historynotes.info/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/map.png
And i noticed that many different places was cut in 2 and given the names "inferior" and "superior". I asked my teacher why it was like this and if there were any similarities on why this was done. My history teacher actually had no idea even after googling so does anyone here know?
'Inferior' means lower and 'superior' means upper. So these are geographic descriptions. Therefore 'Germania superior' would be upper Germania and 'Germania inferior' would be lower Germania. Upper and lower usually refers to a region's position on a river, in this case the Rhine river. Upper being upstream and lower being downstream. This naming system is still common in Europe, for example in France where a region can be called Haute (upper) and Bas (lower) for example Haute-Rhin (upper Rhine) and Bas-Rhin (lower Rhine).
Edit: Haut-Rhin
What about other Roman province adjectives? Why did they use them. Was there a defined way Rome named provinces? Surfing wikipedia, here are the others I've found that seem to be repeated across various provinces.
Salutaris
Pacatiana
Polemoniacus
Libanensis
Prima
Secunda
Magna
I'm sure i've missed some.
