In 27 BC, the region was organized as a Roman province called Illyricum, directly governed by Rome and with Scodra as its capital.

The province of Dalmatia spread inland to cover all of the Dinaric Alps and most of the eastern Adriatic coast, including all of Montenegro.

The first written records of any kind of settlement in southern Dalmatia refer to the Roman province of Praevalitana and the Roman city of Birsiminium, which lived in the shadow of the Illyrian town of Doclea (Duklja), a large city by the standards of that time, boasting 8–10 thousand inhabitants and named after one of the two major Illyrian tribes inhabiting these parts, the "Docleatae".

The Docleatae inhabited the fertile valley of the River Zeta, located along the vital link between the coastal and continental regions of Montenegro, which helped their swift economic rise.

After the Slavic tribes settled in this area they established another settlement, which took over the role previously held by Doclea: it was named Ribnica (Podgorica).

The native non-romanized population retreated into the Albanian highlands, while Acruvium (present-day Kotor) on the coast survived the Slav attacks and prospered as a merchant city-state of the original romanized Illyrians until the 10th century.