Caesarea Maritima

For the modern town, see Caesarea (modern town). For other places with the same name, see Caesarea (disambiguation).

Caesarea
Καισάρεια / قيصرية / קיסריה
The ruins of Caesarea Maritima, with the modern resort town of Caesarea (Keisarya) shown in the top right
Caesarea Maritima is located in Israel
Caesarea Maritima
Shown within Israel
LocationCaesarea National Park, Hof HaCarmel Regional Council, Israel
RegionSharon plain
Coordinates32°30′0″N 34°53′30″E / 32.50000°N 34.89167°E / 32.50000; 34.89167
TypeSettlement
Part ofRoman Judea, Syria Palaestina
History
BuilderAbdashtart I
Founded4th century BCE
Abandoned1265
PeriodsClassical antiquity to High Middle Ages
CulturesPhoenician, Roman, Byzantine
Site notes
ManagementIsrael Nature and Parks Authority
Public accessYes

Caesarea (/ˌsɛzəˈriːə, ˌsɛs-, ˌsiːz-/ SE(E)Z-ə-REE-ə, SESS-; Koinē Greek: Καισάρεια, romanized: Kaisáreia; Hebrew: קֵיסָרְיָה, romanized: Qēsāryā; Arabic: قَيْصَرِيَّة, romanized: Qayṣāriyyah or Arabic: قيسارية or Arabic: قيساريا), also Caesarea Maritima, Caesarea Palaestinae or Caesarea Stratonis,[1][2][a] was an ancient and medieval port city on the coast of the eastern Mediterranean, and later a small fishing village. It was the capital of Roman Judaea, Syria Palaestina and Palaestina Prima, successively, for a period of c. 650 years and a major intellectual hub of the Mediterranean.[3][4] Today, the site is part of the Caesarea National Park, on the western edge of the Sharon plain in Israel.

The site was first settled in the 4th century BCE as a Phoenician colony and trading village known as Straton's Tower[5] after the ruler of Sidon. It was enlarged in the 1st century BCE under Hasmonean rule, becoming a Jewish village;[6] and in 63 BCE, when the Roman Republic annexed the region, it was declared an autonomous city. It was then significantly enlarged in the Roman period by the Judaean client King Herod the Great, who established a harbour and dedicated the town and its port to Caesar Augustus as Caesarea.

During the early Roman period, Caesarea became the seat of the Roman procurators in the region.[7][8] The city was populated throughout the 1st to 6th centuries CE and became an important early centre of Christianity during the Byzantine period. Its importance may have waned following the Muslim conquest of 640 when the city, then known in Arabic as Qisarya (قيسارية), lost its status as provincial capital.[9] After being re-fortified by Muslim rulers in the 11th century, it was conquered by the Crusaders, who strengthened and made it into an important port, which was finally slighted by the Mamluks in 1265.

Qisarya was a small fishing village in the early modern period. In February 1948, during the 1948 Palestine war and Nakba, some of its population fled following an attack on a bus by the Zionist militant group Lehi, and the remainder were expelled by the Palmach, who subsequently demolished its houses.[10] The ruins of the ancient city beneath the depopulated village were excavated in the 1950s and 1960s for archaeological purposes.[11]

  1. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Raban Holum 1996 p. was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Masalha 2018 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Rabbān, A.; Holum, K.G. (1996). Caesarea Maritima: A Retrospective After Two Millennia. Documenta et monumenta orientis antiqui / Documenta et monumenta orientis antiqui. E.J.Brill. p. 578. ISBN 978-90-04-10378-8. As the city was the capital first of all Palestine , then of Palaestina Prima , the άpxov and his officium resided there
  4. ^ Prawer, J.; Ben-Shammai, H. (1996). The History of Jerusalem: The Early Muslim Period (638-1099). NYU Press. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-8147-6639-2. Retrieved 8 May 2023. …Caesarea, not Jerusalem, was the provincial administrative capital. Denying any further administrative status to Caesarea, the Muslims transferred the center of provincial administration first to Lod and then to Ramla…
  5. ^ Evans, Craig A. (14 January 2014). The Routledge Encyclopedia of the Historical Jesus. Routledge. ISBN 9781317722243 – via Google Books.
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Straton was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ "Founded in the years 22-10 or 9 B.C. by Herod the Great, close to the ruins of a small Phoenician naval station named Strato's Tower (Stratonos Pyrgos, Turns Stratonis), which flourished during the 3d to 1st c. B.C. This small harbor was situated on the N part of the site. Herod dedicated the new town and its port (limen Sebastos) to Caesar Augustus. During the Early Roman period, Caesarea was the seat of the Roman procurators of the province of Judea. Vespasian, proclaimed emperor at Caesarea, raised it to the rank of Colonia Prima Flavia Augusta, and later Alexander Severus raised it to the rank of Metropolis Provinciae Syriae Palestinae." A. Negev, "CAESAREA MARITIMA Palestine, Israel" in: Richard Stillwell et al. (eds.), The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites (1976).
  8. ^ Isaac, B.H., The Near East Under Roman Rule: Selected Papers (Brill, 1997), p. 15
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference Hansen was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ Morris 2004, p. 129-130: "As we have seen, Haganah policy until the end of March was non-expulsive. But there were one or two local, unauthorised initiatives… And there was one authorised expulsion. The inhabitants of Qisarya, south of Haifa, lived and cultivated Jewish (PICA) and Greek Orthodox church lands. One leading family evacuated the village on 10 January. Most of the population left – apparently for neighbouring Tantura – immediately after the 31 January LHI ambush of a bus that had just pulled out of Qisarya in which two Arabs died and eight were injured (one of the dead and several injured were from the village). The Haganah decided to occupy the site because the land was PICA-owned. But after moving in, the Haganah feared that the British might eject them. The commanders asked headquarters for permission to level the village. Yitzhak Rabin, the Palmah’s head of operations, opposed the destruction – but he was overruled. On 19–20 February, the Palmah’s Fourth Battalion demolished the houses. The 20-odd inhabitants who were found at the site were moved to safety and some of the troops looted the abandoned homes. A month later, the Arabs were still complaining to local Jewish mukhtars that their stolen money and valuables had not been returned. The Qisarya Arabs, according to Aharon Cohen, had ‘done all in their power to keep the peace . . . The villagers had supplied agricultural produce to Jewish Haifa and Hadera . . . The attack was perceived in Qisarya – and not only there – as an attempt by the Jews to force them (the Arabs) living in the Jewish area, to leave . . .’”
  11. ^ Raban and Holum, 1996, p. 54


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