[5] The document comprises a list of the names of all the provinces of the empire (c. 100 in total), organised according to the twelve newly created regional groupings called dioceses.
Although the dioceses are presented in a single list, they are not ordered in a single geographical sequence but rather in two separate eastern and western groups, the eastern group (Oriens, Pontica, Asiana, Thraciae, Moesiae, Pannoniae) preceding the western (Britanniae, Galliae, Viennensis, Italiae, Hispaniae, Africa).
The eastern half of the list circles the Mediterranean neatly anticlockwise from south to north or, in continental terms, from Africa, through Asia, to Europe.
The arrangement of the western half is less tidy, though it is approximately anticlockwise from north to south, or from Europe to Africa.
Even in the cases of those barbarians clearly living within provinces, however, the Laterculus suggests that a meaningful distinction was drawn between "civilized" and "uncivilized" areas.