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

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.