Antiquity
Sack of the synagogue of Daphne by circus factions, bones exhumed and burned
489 et 507·Antioche, Daphné
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 suburb of Daphne, to the south of Antioch, housed an ancient synagogue and a Jewish cemetery. On two occasions, in 489 and then in 507, the circus factions — the Greens and the Blues, which structured the political life of the great cities of the Roman Orient — turned against the Jewish quarter: the synagogue was pillaged and burned, and the bones from the graves exhumed and then burned.
The second episode is recounted by John Malalas, the city's chronicler. These acts of violence did not stem from an imperial decision but from the grip of the factions on the streets; they show that the legal protection still enjoyed by the communities was worth little when the city went up in flames.
- Period :
- Antiquity
- Type :
- Pogrom
- Region :
- Near and Middle East
- Country :
- Turquie
Jean Malalas, *Chronographie* ; Glanville Downey, *A History of Antioch in Syria*.