After the region fell to the Romans in 168 BC it became part of Epirus nova that was in turn part of the Roman province of Macedonia. Later it was part of provinces of the Byzantine empire called Themes.

When the Roman Empire was divided into East and West in 395, the territories of modern Albania became part of the Byzantine Empire

Beginning in the first decades of Byzantine rule (until 461), the region suffered devastating raids by Visigoths, Huns, and Ostrogoths. In the 6th and 7th centuries, the region experienced an influx of Slavs.

The new administrative system of the themes, or military provinces created by the Byzantine Empire, contributed to the eventual rise of feudalism in Albania, as peasant soldiers who served military lords became serfs on their landed estates. Among the leading families of the Albanian feudal nobility were the Balsha, Thopia, Shpata, Muzaka, Dukagjini and Kastrioti. The first three of these rose later to become rulers of principalities during the years 1355-1400.

Many Albanians converted to the Roman Catholic Church at that period

In the first decades under Byzantine rule (until 461), Epirus nova suffered the devastation of raids by Visigoths, Huns, and Ostrogoths. Not long after these barbarian invaders swept through the Balkans, the Slavs appeared. Between the 6th and 8th centuries they settled in Roman territories. In the 4th century, barbarian tribes began to prey upon the Roman Empire. The Germanic Goths and Asiatic Huns were the first to arrive, invading in mid-century; the Avars attacked in AD 570; and the White Croatian tribes invaded in the early 7th century. In general, the invaders destroyed or weakened Roman and Byzantine cultural centers in the lands that would become Albania.