Provincia Syria Συριακη Επαρχια |
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Province of the Roman Empire | |||||
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Roman Syria highlighted in 125 AD | |||||
Capital | Antioch | ||||
History | |||||
• | Conquest of Syria-Coele by Pompey | 64 BC | |||
• | Incorporation of Syria Palaestina | 135 AD | |||
Today part of |
Lebanon Syria Turkey |
Provincia Syria Coele Συριακη Κοίλη Επαρχια |
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Province of the Roman Empire | |||||
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Roman Empire in 210 | |||||
Capital | Antioch | ||||
History | |||||
• | Established | 200 | |||
• | Disestablished | 314 | |||
Today part of |
Syria Turkey |
Syria was an early Roman province, annexed to the Roman Republic in 64 BC by Pompey in the Third Mithridatic War, following the defeat of Armenian King Tigranes the Great. Following the partition of the Herodian Kingdom into tetrarchies in 6 AD, it was gradually absorbed into Roman provinces, with Roman Syria annexing Iturea and Trachonitis. Later, in 135 AD, in the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt, Syrian province was merged with Judea province, creating the larger province of Syria Palaestina.
During the Principate.
Syria Palæstina was established by the merger of Roman Syria and Roman Jud(a)ea, following the defeat of the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 135. The Syrian army took part in the quelling of the revolt in 132-136, and in the aftermath, the emperor Hadrian added the greatly depopulated province of Judea to the province of Syria thus forming Syria-Palaestina.
The governor of Syria retained the civil administration of the whole large province undiminished, and held for long alone in all Asia a command of the first rank. It was only in the course of the second century that a diminution of his prerogatives occurred, when Hadrian took one of the four legions from the governor of Syria and handed it over to the governor of Palestine. It was Severus who at length withdrew the first place in the Roman military hierarchy from the Syrian governor. After having subdued the province (which had wished at that time to make Niger emperor, as it had formerly done with its governor Vespasian) amidst resistance from the capital Antioch in particular, he ordained its partition into a northern and a southern half, and gave to the governor of the former, which was called Coele-Syria, two legions, to the governor of the latter, the province of Syro-Phoenicia, one legion.