Nadene Goldfoot
The Arch of Titus in Rome Depicting the Jewish Slaves Taken from Jerusalem
The last king of Israel was Hoshea (730-721 BCE).
Assyria in western Asia had attacked Israel and taken away many of the people as slaves in 732 BCE. Jerusalem had become a vassal of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Judah had divided from Israel and was the southern section of Israel. The last king of theirs was Zedekiah (597-586 BCE). From 587-6 BCE
The Babylonians, also of western Asia, the land of Shinar or of the Kasdim (Chaldees), of Ur, (Iraq), were from the Chaldees, an ancient Babylonian city. It was Abraham's place of birth. The Babylonians had conquered Jerusalem. Nebuchadnezzar II fought Pharoah Apries's attempt to invade Judah. Jerusalem was mostly destroyed including the 1st Temple and the city's prominent citizens were deported to Babylon.
Cyrus the Great came along in 539 BCE and conquered
Babylon. He allowed the Babylonian Jews who had been there for almost 50 years to return from captivity to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple. That was about 2 generations that had lived in Babylon.
Artaxerxes III tried to retake the city and Jerusalem revolted against him in 350 BCE. The city burned down in the melee. Jews who supported the revolt were sent to
Hyrcania on the Caspian Sea.
Jerusalem capitulated from 332-200 BCE to Alexander the Great and is later incorporated into the Ptolemaic Kingdom in 301 BCE and then the Seleucid Empire of 200 BCE. Things got worse for Jews. By 175 BCE Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Seleucid, tried to eradicate the Jewish religion by outlawing Sabbath and circumcision. He sacked Jerusalem and erected an altar to Zeus in the 2nd Temple after plundering it. In 164 BCE the Hasmoneans take control of part of Jerusalem while the Seleucids had control of the fortress (Acra) in the city and most of the surrounding areas. By 63 BCE the Roman Empire under
Pompey took Jerusalem.
Before 70 CE Jews were living in
France. Communities existed there during the Roman Empire period. Christianity came along and established anti-Jewish laws. By 1306 they were thrown out. In 1420 the Jewish community in Toulouse, France was annihilated.
General Titus
70 CE, a Roman, ended the major part of the Great Jewish Revolt that had begun in 66 CE and
destroyed the 2nd Jewish Temple. that he referred to as "Herod's Temple." Many Jews were killed. Those residents of Jerusalem who survived the attack were scattered through Rome's Empire by the Romans themselves. This victory was called early as the fighting went on for 3 more years. Vespasian had commanded the Roman campaign against the Jews until the death of Nero in 68. Vespasian then passed his command to his son, Titus and returned to Rome. There he was declared the new Emperor in 69.
A parade took place in
Rome. Besides all the booty that the Romans seized out of Jerusalem which was gold and silver, yards and yards of fine material were the Jewish slaves. They walked not as a mob but an orderly line of prisoners worth seeing clothed in a variety and beauty of clothing that diverted the eyes of the Romans from their injuries incurred in battle. The sacking of Jerusalem is depicted on the
Arch of Titus in Rome today. Romans viewed the objects taken from the holy Temple: a golden table, a 7 golden lamp stands with branches or arms extended emphasizing the honor paid by the Jews to the number seven. The tablet of the Jewish Law was carried last, then ivory and gold objects. Vespasian and Titus rode on horseback at the end. This was a holiday celebrating their victory against the Jews. Jews have lived in Italy since the 2nd century BCE in Rome and then in the southern ports and along trade routes in at least 40 places. In the 1200's in Naples persecution in Naples forced some Jews to convert. In 1541 the Jews of of kingdom of
Naples were kicked out.
From 132 - 135 CE the last stand against the Romans was fought by the Jewish
Bar Kochba who lost the fight with the very brutal Romans. Hundreds of thousands of Jews were killed or exiled. Hadrian formally re-established Jerusalem in 136 as
Aelia Capitolina and the land as
Palaestina. He forbade the Jewish and Christian presence in the city, but Jews lived in other parts of what was Israel and Judea. Two years later the restrictions were relaxed for Christians but not for Jews. From Italy many Jews wound up in Middle East lands until 1948. Others headed for Germany and on up from there into Eastern Europe.
The Roman Empire dates from 27 BCE, when Octavian became Emperor, Augustus. Kings ruled it first, then the Roman Republic, and then by an emperor. The slaves brought to Rome could have been sold and transported to other parts of the Roman Empire which would be in today's lands of
Britain but not yet Scotland,
Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Germany, Egypt and the north coast of Africa. The Romans in charge spoke Latin. By 1355 there were 12,000 Jews who were massacred by a mob in Toledo, Spain.
Trade was most important for Rome, a city of more than a million people, the largest in the world at that time. Possibly Jews got involved in this. They needed wheat from Egypt, tin from Britannia, mainly from the peninsula of Cornwall, grapes from Gaul, etc. In return, the Romans built capitals into fine cities, protected people from raids by barbarians and provided education and career opportunities for the young adults in the provinces such as careers in the Roman army. They had a staff of civil servants.
Their political power shifted to Constantinople and the Catholic Church replaced Rome's authority. Germanic tribes living along the northern borders of the empire and were mercenaries in the Roman army emerged as powerful forces in their own. The Visigoths were one of many German tribes. Rome experienced an invasion of the Visigoths.
Hungary became home to Jews from the 100's as a Jewish grave was found dating back to the 2nd century. . Jewish communities were known about in the 800's. From 1349 till 1360 Jews were thrown out of Hungary.
In 321 there were Jews living in Cologne,
Germany. They settled in other places then along the
Rhineland. Jewish soldiers were in the Roman garrisons in Germany as well. by the 8th and 9th centuries the Carolingian royal house was pro-Jewish and encouraged the settlement of Jews because they wanted to develop trading.
Romania was also home to Jews since the 300's. They were among the 1st settlers of the city of Roman in 1391. In 1421 Jews were kicked out of
Austria. Jews had come to Austria with the Romans, but for sure in 906. It was the persecutions going on in Germany that forced them to move to Austria. The Holocaust, murdering 6 million Jews started in Germany with the Nazi regime from 1939 to 1945, but offenses started much earlier in the 1930's.
By 324-325 the Emperor Constantine held the 1st council of Nicaea and made Jerusalem a Christian patriarchate. Waves of Christian immigration to the city began. Jews were finally allowed to enter once a year to pray at the Western Wall on Tisha b'Av. The first monastery in Jerusalem on the Mount of Lives was built in 380.
Jews lived in
Poland from the 800's on. It is thought that settlers came from either Germany, Bohemia or Kiev in Russia or the Byzantine Empire. The thought is that they were reinforced by KHAZAR elements. Khazaria was an empire in southern Russia created in the 700's. The Kagan converted to Judaism and it was a haven for Jews suffering from discrimination in other states. Early settlers in Poland were thought to be traders. In the Dark Ages they helped to open up the area to civilizing influences. The first Jewish charter was in 905. Then the Tartars of Russia invaded Poland in 1240. To restore the economy, the kings encouraged immigration of merchants from Germany. They brought with them their language of Yiddish which is a combination of Hebrew and German, rituals and passionate devotion to Talmud study. 1648-1656 was the scene of 100,000 Jews murdered in Poland in the Chmielnicki massacre.
Also in the 800's were Jews that immigrated to the
Ukraine in waves from
KHAZARIA, the Caliphate and Byzantium until the 1100's. Jews immigrated there from Central Europe from the 1300's to the 1400's. and from Poland from the 1500's to 1600's. Massacres of Jews then took place. to the 1700's. Hasidic movements sprang up in the 1700's. Zionism took place here from 1800 to 1900's. People moved in here from Galicia and White Russia. It was always a center of anti-Semitism and the scene of many pogroms.from 1905 to 1918.
In 1099 the 1st Crusaders captured Jerusalem from Muslims and slaughtered most of the city's Muslim and Jewish inhabitants. The Dome of the Rock was converted into a church. In 1267 Nachmanides went to Jerusalem and prayed at the Western Wall and reported that he found only 2 Jewish families in the city. As they weren't allowed to really live there, Jews found other places nearby that weren't on the radar of tourists.
Again, Hungarian Jews had a segregation of Jews from others in the 1200's and they had to wear a badge. Jews living in
England in 1290 were thrown out.
In 1321 Jews were starting to live in
Lithuania. By 1398 Karaites lived around Kovno totaling 10,000. by 1495, after the Spanish Inquisition, to 1502 they were thrown out of the country, in line with Spanish Christianity. They were allowed back in by 1529 but had to wear the Jewish badge by 1566. Jews were living in Latvia in Courland from the 1500's. 2,000 lived there in 1795 when it was annexed to Russia.
In 1492 was the Spanish Inquisition in
Spain when all Jews either had to convert to Catholicism or leave the country. They left for
Portugal. 180,000 Jews left. 50,000 converted and remained. In 1497 Jews in
Sicily, Sardinia and Portugal were kicked out of their countries. In 1502 all Jews in Rhodes were either converted or taken into slavery.
By 1517 the Ottoman Empire captured Jerusalem under Sultan Selim I, now Caliph of the Islamic world. In 1700 Judah the Pious and 1,000 followers settled in Jerusalem. In 1821 the population majority in Jerusalem were the Greek Orthodox Christians. In 1860 the first Jewish neighborhood was built outside the Old City walls, so from 1873 to 1875 Mea Shearim was built. The returning Jews came in 1882, known as the 1st Aliyah. They were Russians tired of being in pogroms. However, by 1901 the Ottomans had restrictions on Jewish immigration and land acquisition in Jerusalem. 1901 to 1914 was the period of the 2nd Aliyah and 40,000 Jewish pioneers entered.
It wasn't until 1812 that Bessarabia, formerly Romanian, part of Moldavian and Ukrainian Republics, were found to have Jews living there. At this time it was annexed to Russia. Jews weren't allowed in Russia proper from 1791 until 1882 as decreed by Catherine II. That's why they were confined in the Pale of Settlement which constituted Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraiane and Belorussia. Bessarabia and White Russia are also included in this. Jews had been kicked out of Russia by 1727 and again in 1747. In 1871 to 1921 anti-Jewish pogroms took place in the towns of Russia. From 1882 to 1890, there were 750,000 Jews living in Russia who were forced to re-settle in the Pale, even though the decree was up. This is when many Jews managed to leave for the USA and Great Britain. Even in 1891, Jews were expelled form Moscow and St. Petersburg.
In 614, a Jewish force of about 20,000 aided the Persians (today's Iran) in the conquest of the land of Palestine. In exchange, the Persians promised some autonomy and the right to return to Jerusalem. This was ended by the Byzantines coming to power. In 1838 in Meshed, Persia, the entire Jewish community was forced to convert to Islam or face death.
WWI from 1914-1917 had the Ottomans on the side of the Axis powers of Germany and they lost. The British took control and held the mandate. The Balfour Declaration was issued a month before the end of the war. The 3rd Aliyah happened from 1919 to 1923 and brought in 35,000 Jewish immigrants to the mandatory Palestine region. From 1924 to 1928 the 4th Aliyah had 82,000 Jewish immigrants entering Palestine. From 1929 to 1939, a bad year in Germany for Jews, the 5th Aliyah brought in 250,000 Jewish immigrants. Many were turned back that were escaping Nazi Germany. This was already announced to be the National Jewish Home and was cleared by the League of Nations, but Britain had sided with the Arabs by then.
In 1941, when WWII started, the Jewish community in Baghdad was attacked by mobs which killed 180 Jews.
1948-49 amounted to an Arab Israeli War and all Jewish residents of the eastern part of the city were kicked out by the Arab forces and the entire Jewish Quarter was destroyed.
Jews found land to live in-but only temporarily. They had to be on the move. Now they're staying put in their own country after 2,000 years of this turmoil only to face fighting for it for dear life. As for the Land of Israel and Judah, it was never occupied by people who ruled for 1878 years from 70 to 1948. Foreign governments claimed the land; and that was it. The name was changed and not much else.
Resource:http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/rometriumph.htm
http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/roem/hd_roem.htm
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Empire
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0015_0_15340.html
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/pale.html
facts about Israel from division of information, ministry for foreign affairs, Jerusalem
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
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