There were at times primates in Numidia and Byzacena,[1] and Donatist claimants,[2] but generally the role of the Bishop of Carthage was seen as preeminent.
[1][3] In the 3rd century, at the time of Cyprian, the Bishop of Carthage exercised a real though not formalized primacy in the Early African Church,[4] not only in the Roman province of Proconsular Africa in the broadest sense (even when divided into three provinces including Byzacena and Tripolitania) but also, in some supra-metropolitan form, over the Church in Numidia and Mauretania.
The provincial primacy was associated with the senior bishop in the province rather than with a particular see and was of little importance in comparison to the authority of the bishop of Carthage, who could be appealed to directly by the clergy of any province.
"[1][6] At the beginning of the 8th century and at the end of the 9th century, the Patriarch of Alexandria claimed jurisdiction over Carthage, however in 1053 Pope Leo IV confirmed the primacy of Carthage[7] and twenty years later Pope Gregory VII reiterated Leo's statement.
The title of primate was applied to the Archbishop of Carthage and Tunis for a time from 1894 until Tunisian independence in 1964.