of the imperial commanders, Marcius Turbo and Lucius Quietus, conducted the military operations. The war—for the Jewish revolt of A.D. 116-7 assumed the proportions of a grave war—lasted well-nigh two years; but the insurgents were in the end completely routed.
The numbers of slain in this wild and undisciplined outburst of Jewish fury, according to the records of the historians of the war, are so great that we are tempted to suspect them exaggerated. In Cyrene and the neighbouring districts the number who perished is given as twenty-two thousand; the loss of life in Alexandria, Egypt, and Cyprus seems to have been equally terrible. But even granted that the numbers of Jews who perished in this fanatical rebellion have been, from one cause or other, exaggerated, it is certain that the numbers of the slain were enormous, that the power and influence of the Chosen People suffered a terrible check as the result of this rising, and that in the great cities of Cyrene and Alexandria the Jewish population of these centres—large and flourishing communities, possessing great wealth and influence, distinguished for their high culture and learning—were almost annihilated. The results of the insane revolts of A.D. 116-7 were indeed disastrous to the fortunes of this extraordinary and wonderful people.
But the end was not yet. Another bloody war, with all its fearful consequences, had to be waged between the Jew and the Empire before the Chosen People finally resigned itself to the new life it was destined to live through the long centuries which followed. The old spirit of restlessness, of wild visionary hopes of some great one who should arise in their midst, still lived among the more ardent and fervid members of the now scattered and diminished people.
The exciting causes of the last great revolt have been variously stated. It is probable that the conduct of Hadrian in his latter years had become less tolerant, while a persecuting spirit more or less prevailed in his government. Among other irritating measures devised by Rome, the ancient rite of circumcision apparently was forbidden. But the immediate cause of the Jewish uprising no doubt was the steady progress
