Annihilation of the community of Salamis during the Kitos war; the island is thereafter forbidden to Jews on pain of death

Under Trajan, while the Roman army was encamped in Mesopotamia, the Jewish communities of Cyrenaica, Egypt, and Cyprus rose up almost simultaneously. This is the revolt that Jewish sources call the Kitos War, named after the general Lusius Quietus who was charged with suppressing it.

In Cyprus, the insurrection was led by a certain Artémion. Salamine, the principal city of the island and seat of an ancient community, was destroyed. Dion Cassius, writing a century later, puts forward figures that modern historians consider far in excess of what the island's population could have numbered.

After the repression, a decree forbade any Jew from setting foot on the island, on pain of death — including those cast ashore by shipwreck. No community is attested there before the late Byzantine period. This is the only territorial prohibition of this nature in the Roman Empire.