Antiquity
An imperial altar erected by the Greeks of the city and overturned by the Jews, origin of Caligula's order to place his statue in the Temple
40·Jamnia
The toll is reproduced exactly as the source states it — never rounded, never added to another. Tolls overlap from one event to the next.
The Greek inhabitants of Jamnia erected a brick altar dedicated to the emperor in this predominantly Jewish city of Judea; the Jews immediately tore it down. The incident, reported to Caligula by his procurator, served as a pretext for the order to erect a statue of the emperor in the Temple of Jerusalem.
The legate Publius Petronius delayed for months before a population that declared itself ready to die en masse rather than allow it, and only the death of Caligula resolved the matter. Jamnia soon became, under the name of Yavné, the seat of the reconstituted sanhedrin: the place of provocation became the place of reconstruction.
- Period :
- Antiquity
- Type :
- Massacre
- Region :
- Land of Israel
- Country :
- Terre d'Israël
Philon d'Alexandrie, Legatio ad Caium ; Flavius Josèphe, Antiquités judaïques.