File:Palestine after Pompey's rearrangement (Smith, 1915).jpg

English: In the spring of 63 B.C. Pompey marched S. by Lysias, near Apamea, Heliopolis, and Chalcis to Damascus (xiv Antt., iii. 2, amended by Niese, vol. iii. p. xxii.), executing on the way the tyrants of Tripoli and Byblus, but he left Ptolemy Menna^i (see previous map) to his Ituraean dominions with reduced authority. Having received the rival Jewish princes Hyrkanus and Aristobulus, with representatives of their people, he set out against the Nabatseans, but learning that Aristobulus was preparing at Alexandrium (Kurn-Surtubeh) to resist the Roman decision if adverse to himself, Pompey turned by Pella, Scythopolis, and Korea (Tell el Mazar, above W. Kurawa el-Mas'udy) into Judaea, and, securing a base of supplies at Jericho, besieged and took Jerusalem.

The whole of Syria, from the Euphrates to the river of Egypt (W. el 'Arish), was taken for Rome, and organised in such different relations to her authority as were suitable to the various nationalities and their politics and histories prior to the conquests of Alexander Jannaeus. The Province of Syria was constituted, including at first all Upper Syria "—as far S. as the Lebanons—and the coast land of Palestine—both Phoenicia and Philistia, all of it for the first time under the former of these names—as far S. as Raphia. The cities released from the tyrants were declared " free," with an " aristocratic ** constitution (Josephus), and rights of coinage, asylum, and property in the surrounding districts, but liable to military service and fiscally subject to the province. The relations of Tyre and Sidon to the province may have differed from those of the others, for, like Askalon, they had preserved their autonomy. Similar freedom within the province was granted to the Greek cities of Ccele-Syria, which term, proper to the valley between the Lebanons, now (and perhaps from an earlier time) covered the interior of the country southwards on both sides of the Jordan.

Soon after this some of these cities formed, in defence against their Semitic neighbours, the league known from its original number as Decapolis:—Scythopolis (the only one W. of Jordan, unless, as Marquardt and Holscher think, Samaria was included later), Pella, Gadara, and Hippos; Dion, Gerasa, Philadelphia, Raphana (unknown), Kanatha, and Damascus later. Other eight were added: Abila, Kanata, KapitoUas, and some of the frontier Semitic towns, incorporated in the Empire in 106 B.C.

The Nabataeans, again withdrawn from Damascus, had already recovered part of Moabitis from the Jews, including all S. of the Arnon, and Alousa, W, of the Dead Sea.

Idumaea, abandoned to the Nabatseans by Hyrkanus II, appears to have been under the Idumsean Antipater, whose father (of the same name) had been appointed its governor by Jannaeus. Its two chief towns, Adora and Marissa, were declared free.

To Hyrkanus II, with the titles of Ethnarch and High Priest, there were left only the Jewish territories of Judaea proper, Galilee and Peraea, but in fiscal subjection to the province. The S. border of Judaea is uncertain: the map marks it N. of Adora, but possibly it ought to run S. of that town. In 57 Gabinius deprived Hyrkanus of his civil powers, and divided the country into five Synedria or Synodoi, with separate jurisdictions and their centres at Jerusalem, Gadara (?Gezer), Amathus, Jericho, and Sepphoris, Antipater being the Epimeletes or fiscal superintendent of the whole. In 47 Caesar restored to Hyrkanus the title of Ethnarch, and made Antipater Epitropos or Procurator of Judaea in the larger sense, i.e. the above three districts along with Idumaea.

All the above names are on the map. Unknown are the positions of Hyrkanium (taken by Gabinius), Thrax and Taurus (forts in the passes leading to Jericho, taken by Pompey), Arethusa (in Phihstia ?), and Gaba.