Palestine · A closer look
135
Syria Palaestina
After crushing the Bar Kokhba revolt, the emperor Hadrian folded Judaea into a province he named Syria Palaestina and rebuilt Jerusalem as a Roman colony, Aelia Capitolina, from which Jews were barred. The Roman name passed to the Byzantines, and from them into Arabic as Filastin.
Rebellion against Rome
The revolt led by Simon bar Kokhba began in 132 CE, more than sixty years after the destruction of the Second Temple in the earlier Jewish war. Roman policies under Hadrian, including the refounding of Jerusalem, formed part of its background. The rebels established control over parts of Judaea before a major Roman military response defeated them. The war devastated communities and became a turning point in Jewish history.
Source: Livius: The revolt of Bar Kochba
Jerusalem after the defeat
The Christian writer Eusebius describes the fall of the rebel stronghold at Betar and the exclusion of Jews from Jerusalem and its surroundings. His account was written later and needs to be read as a historical source with its own perspective. The Roman colony's name, Aelia Capitolina, honoured Hadrian and Roman religion. These changes concerned imperial power and the city itself, not the disappearance of all Jewish life from the wider region.
City, province and region
Jerusalem was not the province's administrative capital: that role belonged to coastal Caesarea, whose harbour, public buildings and governor's palace connected it to the Roman world. Caesarea also became a centre of Jewish and Christian scholarship. Distinguishing the city from the province helps explain how different communities and institutions continued under Roman rule. Syria Palaestina was an administrative name within an empire, not a state in the modern sense.
Source: Livius: Caesarea Maritima