4 ms·

Undisputed is saying a lot. The Talmud, not by coincidence, light on a lot of political (and religious) detail from this period. The political turmoil leading

by netcan 5y ago

Undisputed is saying a lot. The Talmud, not by coincidence, light on a lot of political (and religious) detail from this period. The political turmoil leading (in Talmudic text) to the temple's destruction are somewhat taboo. Anyway... place names are resilient. The region is littered with Hebrew/Assyrian/etc place names that outsurvived the political/cultural entities for centuries. That Philistia survived as a regional name is not that big a stretch, especially as a greek-related culture during a greek-dominated era. We don't even know with certainty why our current politicians do what they do.

yyyk 5y ago
Place names can be resilient. They can be also very political, e.g. the different spelling of places in Ukraine, which depends if one is looking at them from a Russian POV or not. Even Ukraine itself is spelt differently (Russia would rather people write "The Ukraine"). There was a rather documented political context back then, of erasing the local name to crush the local population. Wherever Hadrian took the name from a Greek regional slang or from a Greek history book, we need not to ignore that context for today's political reasons either - this doesn't really have any effect on anything. I do find it odd the Romans used two names when switching 'Judea' to 'Syria-Palestine'. There are many Greek references that the describe the entire Levant as 'Syria', more than 'Judea' or 'Palestine' ever being used. Perhaps the Roman needed two names because the second name had become unfamiliar? Come to think of it, there are many uses of 'Syria' for describing the entire Levant even up to the 20th century. The name derives from the Assyrians. We could take the same references and tell a story about how it's a local name etc., and have a better argument than the post starting the thread. However, just about everyone think the SSNP stink, so nobody does that anymore.
- netcan 5y ago
  I don't see the contradiction. Yes, Romans referred to the region as Syria and that also reflected the cultural/political scape for much of the time. Assyria did span the entire region, and even during the Roman era their dialect was spoken by most people (including Judeans). Choice of names is political in the same region now too, and the games leverage the fact that there are many ancient place names making contradictory "claims."
- bjourne 5y ago
  > There was a rather documented political context back then, of erasing the local name to crush the local population. I don't know of any emperor who renamed provinces as retribution. Do you have any examples? > I do find it odd the Romans used two names when switching 'Judea' to 'Syria-Palestine'. Syria was a greater region back then and contained many provinces. See the Wikipedia map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coele_Syria_(Roman_province)#/media/File:Roman_Empire_with_provinces_in_210_AD.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coele_Syria_(Roman_province)#/...

by netcan 5y ago

yyyk 5y ago

Place names can be resilient. They can be also very political, e.g. the different spelling of places in Ukraine, which depends if one is looking at them from a Russian POV or not. Even Ukraine itself is spelt differently (Russia would rather people write "The Ukraine"). There was a rather documented political context back then, of erasing the local name to crush the local population. Wherever Hadrian took the name from a Greek regional slang or from a Greek history book, we need not to ignore that context for today's political reasons either - this doesn't really have any effect on anything. I do find it odd the Romans used two names when switching 'Judea' to 'Syria-Palestine'. There are many Greek references that the describe the entire Levant as 'Syria', more than 'Judea' or 'Palestine' ever being used. Perhaps the Roman needed two names because the second name had become unfamiliar? Come to think of it, there are many uses of 'Syria' for describing the entire Levant even up to the 20th century. The name derives from the Assyrians. We could take the same references and tell a story about how it's a local name etc., and have a better argument than the post starting the thread. However, just about everyone think the SSNP stink, so nobody does that anymore.

netcan 5y ago
I don't see the contradiction. Yes, Romans referred to the region as Syria and that also reflected the cultural/political scape for much of the time. Assyria did span the entire region, and even during the Roman era their dialect was spoken by most people (including Judeans). Choice of names is political in the same region now too, and the games leverage the fact that there are many ancient place names making contradictory "claims."
bjourne 5y ago
> There was a rather documented political context back then, of erasing the local name to crush the local population. I don't know of any emperor who renamed provinces as retribution. Do you have any examples? > I do find it odd the Romans used two names when switching 'Judea' to 'Syria-Palestine'. Syria was a greater region back then and contained many provinces. See the Wikipedia map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coele_Syria_(Roman_province)#/media/File:Roman_Empire_with_provinces_in_210_AD.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coele_Syria_(Roman_province)#/...