Judea (under Roman rule)

A client kingdom that became a province, revolted three times, and was renamed to erase it. Rome first intervened in 63 BCE when Pompey settled a Hasmonean succession dispute by taking Jerusalem, and thereafter governed through clients - most successfully Herod the Great, who kept the peace, rebuilt the Temple on a colossal scale and was hated for his methods and his Idumean ancestry. Direct Roman administration from 6 CE proved harder. Prefects and procurators repeatedly misjudged religious sensitivities, bringing standards bearing images into Jerusalem or raiding the Temple treasury, and the census that inaugurated direct rule itself provoked revolt. The Great Revolt of 66 ended in 70 with the destruction of the Temple, an event that redirected Judaism away from sacrifice towards study and the synagogue, and with Masada's fall three years later. The Kitos War followed in 115, and the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132 to 136 was the most damaging of all: Cassius Dio reports hundreds of thousands killed and hundreds of settlements destroyed. Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem as Aelia Capitolina, barred Jews from it, and renamed the province Syria Palaestina, using an old name for the coastal Philistines - a deliberate act of erasure whose consequences are still being argued about. Rabbinic Judaism was built in the aftermath. Josephus is the main narrative source. Caesarea Maritima served as the Roman administrative capital rather than Jerusalem. Herod also built Masada and the harbour at Caesarea. The Temple menorah appears on the Arch of Titus in Rome. Coins struck after 70 read Judaea Capta.

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