Aelia Capitolina (Latin in full:
Colonia Aelia Capitolina) was a city built by the emperor
HadrianPublius Aelius Hadrianus was emperor of Rome from AD 117 to 138, as well as a Stoic and Epicurean philosopher...
, and occupied by a Roman colony, on the site of
JerusalemJerusalem is the capital of Israel and its largest city in both population and area, with a population of 747,600 residents over an area of if disputed East Jerusalem is included...
, which was in ruins since 70 AD, leaning in part to the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–136.
Politics
JerusalemJerusalem is the capital of Israel and its largest city in both population and area, with a population of 747,600 residents over an area of if disputed East Jerusalem is included...
was still in ruins from the
First Jewish-Roman WarThe first Jewish-Roman War , sometimes called The Great Revolt , was the first of three major rebellions by the Jews of Iudaea Province against the Roman Empire .It began in the year 66 initially because of Greek and Jewish religious tensions...
in 70 A.D.
JosephusJosephus , also known as Yosef Ben Matityahu and, after he became a Roman citizen, as Titus Flavius Josephus, was a first-century Jewish historian and apologist of priestly and royal ancestry who survived and recorded the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70...
, a contemporary, reports that "Jerusalem ... was so thoroughly razed to the ground by those that demolished it to its foundations, that nothing was left that could ever persuade visitors that it had once been a place of habitation."
When Emperor Hadrian vowed to rebuild Jerusalem from the wreckage in 130 A.D., he considered reconstructing Jerusalem as a gift for the Jewish people. The Jews awaited with hope, because Hadrian was considered a moderate. But after Hadrian visited Jerusalem, he decided to build Aelia Capitolina which would be inhabited by his legionnaires. Hadrian also decided to never allow Jews to re-enter the city ever again. Fundamentalist Jews, incensed at this harsh decree, secretly started putting aside arms from the Roman munitions workshops; soon after, a revolt broke out under Simeon ben Kosiba. This Bar Kokhba revolt, which the Romans managed to suppress, enraged Hadrian, and he came to be determined to erase Judaism from the province;
Iudaea provinceIudaea is the term used by historians to refer to the Roman province that extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Israel...
was renamed Syria Palaestina, and Jews were banned from entering the city, on pain of death, except on the day of
Tisha B'Avis an annual fast day in Judaism, named for the ninth day of the month of Av in the Hebrew calendar. The fast commemorates the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem, which occurred about 656 years apart, but on the same date...
. The
SanhedrinThe Sanhedrin was an assembly of twenty-three judges appointed in every city in the Land of Israel.The Talmud states:GEMARA. Whence is this derived? — R...
had earlier relocated to
JamniaThe Council of Jamnia or Council of Yavne is a hypothetical 1st century council at which it is postulated the canon of the Hebrew Bible was defined....
. Hadrian's new plans included temples to the major regional deities, and certain Roman gods, in particular Jupiter Capitolinus; the city had formerly been the single Holy City of most forms of Judaism, see also
Jerusalem in JudaismSince the 10th century BCE Jerusalem in Judaism has been the holiest city, focus and spiritual center of the Jewish people Since the 10th century BCE:...
.
Name
Aelia came from Hadrian's
nomen gentile,
AeliusAelius was the nomen of the ancient Roman gens Aelia. Among its members was the Roman Emperor Hadrian.* Publius Aelius Paetus , consul 337 BC* Gaius Aelius Paetus, consul 286 BC* Publius Aelius Paetus , consul 201 BC...
, while
Capitolina meant that the new city was dedicated to
Jupiter CapitolinusThe Capitoline Hill , between the Forum and the Campus Martius, is one of the seven hills of Rome. By the 16th century, Capitolinus had become Campidoglio in Italian. The English word capitol derives from Capitoline...
, to whom a temple was built on the site of the former
Jewish templeJewish temple:*Jewish temple or The Jewish Temple, may refer to the original two ancient Jewish Temples in Jerusalem. The first one was destroyed by the ancient Babylonians in 586 BCE, and the second was destroyed by Rome in 70 CE....
, the
Temple MountThe Temple Mount , also known as Mount Moriah and by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary , is a religious site in the Old City of Jerusalem. Due to its importance for Judaism and Islam it is one of the most contested religious sites in the world.The Temple Mount contains the holiest site in Judaism...
. The city was without walls, protected by a light garrison of the
Tenth LegionLegio decima Fretensis was a Roman legion levied by Augustus in 41/40 BC to fight during the period of civil war that started the dissolution of the Roman Republic...
, during the Late Roman Period. The detachment at
JerusalemJerusalem is the capital of Israel and its largest city in both population and area, with a population of 747,600 residents over an area of if disputed East Jerusalem is included...
, which apparently encamped all over the city’s western hill, was responsible for preventing
JewThe Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
s from returning to the city. Roman enforcement of this prohibition continued through the fourth century. The Latin name
Aelia is the source of the
ArabicArabic is a Central Semitic language, thus related to and classified alongside other Semitic languages such as Hebrew and the Neo-Aramaic languages. In terms of speakers, the Arabic macrolanguage is the largest member of the Semitic language family. It is spoken by more than 280 million people as...
term Iliya (إلياء), an early
IslamicIslam Islam Islam ( al-’islām,
[There are ten pronunciations of Islam in English, differing in whether the first or second syllable has the stress, whether the s is or , and whether the a is pronounced as in father, as in cat, or (when the stress is on the i) as in the a of sofa...]
name for Jerusalem.
Plan of the city
The urban plan of Aelia Capitolina was that of a typical
RomanAncient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea, it became one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
town wherein main thoroughfares crisscrossed the
urban gridUrban, city, and town planning is the integration of the disciplines of land use planning and transport planning to explore a very wide range of aspects of the built and social environments of urbanized municipalities and communities...
lengthwise and widthwise. The urban grid was based on the usual central north-south road (
cardoIn ancient Roman city planning, a cardo was a north-south-oriented street in cities, military camps, and coloniae. Sometimes called the cardo maximus, the cardo served as the center of economic life...
) and central east-west route (
decumanus). However, as the main cardo ran up the western hill, and the
Temple MountThe Temple Mount , also known as Mount Moriah and by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary , is a religious site in the Old City of Jerusalem. Due to its importance for Judaism and Islam it is one of the most contested religious sites in the world.The Temple Mount contains the holiest site in Judaism...
blocked the eastward route of the main decumanus, a second pair of main roads was added; the secondary cardo ran down the tyropoean valley, and the secondary decumanus ran just to the north of the temple mount. The main Hadrianic cardo terminated not far beyond its junction with the decumanus, where it reached the Roman garrison's encampment, but in the Byzantine era it was extended over the former camp to reach the southern walls of the city.
The two cardines converged near the
Damascus GateThe Damascus Gate is an important gate in the Old City of Jerusalem. The modern gate was built in 1542 by the Ottoman ruler Suleiman the Magnificent.The original gate was presumably built in Second Temple times...
, and a semicircular
piazzaA piazza is a city square, found in Italy, Malta, along the Dalmatian coast and in surrounding regions. The term is roughly equivalent to the Spanish plaza...
covered the remaining space; in the piazza a columnar monument was constructed, hence the traditional name for the gate -
Bab el-Amud (
Gate of the Column).
TetrapylonThe South Tetrapylon is the intersection of Jerash's Cardo with the first cross street in the ancient ruins of Jerash in Jordan dated to the Roman period at the end of the 2nd century AD. Four niched pilasters formed the base of a former central monument....
were constructed at the other junctions between the main roads.
This street pattern has been preserved through Jerusalem's later history; the western cardo is Suq Khan ez-Zeit (
Olive-oil Inn Market), the southern decumanus is both the Street of the Chain and Suq el-Bazaar (
Bazaar Market; called
David Street by Israelis), the eastern cardo is Al-wad Road (
Valley road), and the northern decumanus is now the
Via DolorosaThe Via Dolorosa is a street, in two parts, within the Old City of Jerusalem. Since the 18th century, it has been traditionally held to be the path that Jesus walked, carrying his cross, on the way to his crucifixion...
. The original thoroughfare, flanked by rows of columns and shops, was about 73 feet (22 meters) wide (roughly the equivalent of a present-day six lane motorway), but buildings have extended onto the streets over the centuries, and the modern lanes replacing the ancient grid are now quite narrow. The substantial remains of the western cardo have now been exposed to view near the junction with Suq el-Bazaar, and remnants of one of the tetrapylon are preserved in the 19th century
FranciscanThe term Franciscan is commonly used to refer to members of Catholic religious orders, also known as the Orders of Friars Minor, that follow a body of regulations known as "The rule of St. Francis", or a member of one of these orders. As well as Roman Catholic there are also small Old Catholic and...
chapel at the junction of the Via Dolorosa and Suq Khan ez-Zeit.
As was standard for new Roman cities, Hadrian placed the city's main
ForumThe Roman Forum , sometimes known by its original Latin name, is located between the Palatine hill and the Capitoline hill of the city of Rome. It is the central area around which the ancient Roman civilization developed...
at the junction of the main cardo and decumanus, now the location for the (smaller)
MuristanThe Muristan is a complex of streets and shops in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. The site was the location of the first hospital of the Knights of St...
. Adjacent to the Forum, at the junction of the same cardo, and the other decumanus, Hadrian built a large temple to the
goddessA goddess is a female deity. Often deities are part of a polytheistic system that includes several deities in a pantheon. In some cultures goddesses are commonly associated with the Earth, motherhood, love, and the household, often reflecting the historical gender roles of that culture...
VenusVenus was a major Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty and fertility, who played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths. From the third century BC, the increasing Hellenization of Roman upper classes identified her as the equivalent of the Greek goddess...
, which later became the
Church of the Holy SepulchreThe Church of the Holy Sepulchre , also called the Church of the Resurrection by Eastern Christians, is a Christian church within the walled Old City of Jerusalem....
; despite 11th century destruction, which resulted in the modern Church having a much smaller footprint, several boundary walls of Hadrian's temple have been found among the archaeological remains beneath the Church. The
Struthion Pool lay in the path of the northern decumanus, so Hadrian placed
vaultingA Vault is an architectural term for an arched form used to provide a space with a ceiling or roof. The parts of a vault exert a thrust that require a counter resistance. When vaults are built underground, the ground gives all the resistance required...
over it, added a large pavement on top, and turned it into a secondary Forum; the pavement can still be seen under the
Convent of the Sisters of ZionThe Convent of the Sisters of Zion is a convent of the Congregation of Notre-Dame de Sion, located near to the eastern end of the Via Dolorosa, in Jerusalem. The convent was built in 1857, by Marie-Alphonse Ratisbonne, but the site also contains ancient archaeological remains of significant value.-...
.
External links
See also
- Judea
Judea or Judæa is the name given to the mountainous southern part of the historic Land of Israel , an area now divided between Israel and the West Bank Judea or Judæa (Hebrew: יהודה,
Standard Yəhuda
Tiberian , "praised, celebrated"; Greek: Ιουδαία, Ioudaía; ) is the...
- Iudaea Province
Iudaea is the term used by historians to refer to the Roman province that extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Israel...
- Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name used, among others, to describe a geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands.As a geographical term, Palestine can also refer to 'ancient Palestine,' an area...
- Church of the Holy Sepulchre
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre , also called the Church of the Resurrection by Eastern Christians, is a Christian church within the walled Old City of Jerusalem....
- Kingdom of Jerusalem
The Kingdom of Jerusalem was a Christian kingdom established in the Levant in 1099 after the First Crusade. It lasted nearly two hundred years, from 1099 until 1291 when the last remaining possession, Acre, was destroyed by the Mamluks....
- Names of Jerusalem
This article explores the different names of Jerusalem and their linguistic natures, etc. For a discussion of the politics and history of Jerusalem itself, the Jerusalem article is probably a better place to start....