>>213659556
the ethnic replacement of native Italians was significantly accelerated by the Edict of Caracalla (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_citizenship#The_Edict_of_Caracalla) (212 AD), which granted full Roman citizenship to all free men of the empire. Before the edict, Roman citizenship was predominantly restricted to ethnic Italians.
Caracalla was half Arab on his mother's side and of North African Phoenician/Punic descent on his father's side. Septimius Severus, his father, was the first non-Italic Roman emperor. He was born in North Africa to an Italian mother and Punic father.
In the 23 years following the Edict of Caracalla, Rome had a succession of MENA emperors: Geta, Macrinus, Elagabalus, and Severus Alexander. Their collective reigns culminated in the Crisis of the Third Century (235 - 284 AD), which almost collapsed the Roman Empire. It was eventually saved by two Illyrian Europeans, Aurelian and Diocletian. However, from this point onward, Rome was near continuously headed by non-Italian emperors.