Ventidius Cumanus | |
---|---|
3rd Procurator of Iudaea | |
In office 48 –c. 52 | |
Appointed by | Claudius |
Preceded by | Tiberius Julius Alexander |
Succeeded by | Marcus Antonius Felix |
Personal details | |
Born | 1st century? |
Ventidius Cumanus ( fl. 1st century AD) was the Roman procurator of Iudaea Province from AD 48 to c. AD 52. A disagreement between the surviving sources,the Jewish historian Josephus and the Roman Tacitus,makes it unclear whether his authority was over some or all of the province. Cumanus' time in office was marked by disputes between his troops and the Jewish population. Ventidius Cumanus failed to respond to an anti-Jewish murder in Samaritan territory which led to the violent conflict between Jews and Samaritans. Following an investigation by the governor of Syria,Gaius Ummidius Durmius Quadratus,Cumanus was sent to Rome for a hearing before the Emperor Claudius,who held him responsible for the violence and sentenced him to exile.
Nothing is known about Cumanus before he was appointed procurator of Iudaea in 48,in succession to Tiberius Julius Alexander. [1]
Josephus,the main source for Cumanus' career,presents him as governing the whole of Iudaea until 52,when he was succeeded by Marcus Antonius Felix. [2] However,Tacitus states that Felix was already governing Samaria before 52,while Cumanus had authority over Galilee to the north (see map). [3] Tacitus does not mention who controlled other areas of the province.
This conflict has led historians to take a number of positions on political arrangements in the province. Some have argued that Josephus' greater knowledge of Jewish affairs justifies favouring his account. [4] M. Aberbach believes that there was a division of power,but that Tacitus reversed the governors' areas of authority and that Cumanus actually governed the south and Felix the north;this fits better with Josephus,who describes Cumanus as active in Jerusalem and nearby. [5] Another suggestion is that part of the province was transferred to Felix after disturbances under Cumanus' rule. [6]
Under Alexander,the province of Iudaea had enjoyed a period of relative peace,but that proved to be transient,as Cumanus' governorship was marked by a series of serious public disturbances. Trouble started while Jewish pilgrims were gathered in Jerusalem for the Passover feast. Cumanus,following the precedent set by earlier governors,assembled a detachment of Roman soldiers on the roof of the Temple portico to maintain order among the crowds,but one caused chaos by exposing himself to the Jews in the courtyard while calling out insults. Some of the Jews brought their complaints to Cumanus,but others began to retaliate by hurling stones at the soldiers. [7] Some openly accused Cumanus of being responsible for the provocation – a sign that relations between governor and provincials may already have been poor. [8] Finding himself unable to calm the angry crowd,Cumanus called for fully armed reinforcements,who assembled either in the Temple courtyard or on the roof of the Antonia Fortress,overlooking the Temple. [9] In the ensuing stampede,according to Josephus' estimates,between twenty and thirty thousand people were crushed to death. [10] These numbers may be exaggerated, [8] but the loss of life was substantial;the feast,says Josephus,"became the cause of mourning to the whole nation". [11]
Further unrest was triggered when an Imperial slave named Stephanus was robbed while travelling near Beth-horon. Troops sent by Cumanus to arrest the leading men of the nearby villages began plundering the area. One of them,finding a copy of the Torah,destroyed it in view of the villagers while shouting blasphemies. Angered by this insult to God and to the Jewish religion,a crowd of Jews confronted Cumanus at Caesarea Maritima,demanding that the guilty party should be punished. This time the governor acted decisively and ordered that the soldier responsible should be beheaded in front of his accusers,temporarily restoring the calm. [12]
The events that would cost Cumanus his office began with the murder of one or more Galilean pilgrims who had been travelling through Samaria on their way to Jerusalem. A Galilean embassy asked Cumanus to investigate but received little attention;Josephus alleges that he had been bribed by the Samaritans to turn a blind eye. [13] The result was that a crowd of Jews decided to take the law into their own hands. Under the leadership of two Zealots,Eleazar and Alexander,they invaded Samaria and began a massacre. Cumanus led most of his troops against the militants,killing many and taking others prisoner,and the Jewish leaders from Jerusalem were subsequently able to calm most of the others,but a state of guerrilla warfare persisted. [14]
Meanwhile,two separate embassies had been dispatched to Tyre to appeal to Ummidius Caius Quadratus,who as legatus pro praetore or governor of Syria had some authority over the lower-ranking procurator of Iudaea. One,from the Samaritans,protested the Jewish attacks on Samaritan villages. The Jewish counter-embassy held the Samaritans responsible for the violence and accused Cumanus of siding with them. [15] Agreeing to investigate,Quadratus proceeded in 52 to Iudaea,where he had all of Cumanus' Jewish prisoners crucified and ordered the beheading of several other Jews and Samaritans who had been involved in the fighting. [3] [16]
Perhaps after hearing a case against Cumanus in Iudaea, [3] Quadratus sent him,along with several Jewish and Samaritan leaders including the High Priest Ananias,to plead their cases in Rome before the Emperor Claudius. At the hearing,several of Claudius' influential freedmen officials took the side of Cumanus. However,the Jews were supported by Agrippa II,a friend of Claudius whose father,Agrippa I,had been the last king of Iudaea before the province was placed under Roman procurators. Whether influenced by court politics or not,Claudius decided in favour of the Jewish side. The Samaritan leaders were executed and Cumanus was sent into exile. [17] Felix succeeded him as procurator of Iudaea. [2] Cumanus' life and career after his banishment are unknown.
Samaritans are an ethnoreligious group who originate from the ancient Israelites. They are native to the Levant and adhere to Samaritanism, an Abrahamic and ethnic religion.
Samaria is a historic and biblical name used for the central region of Palestine, bordered by Judea to the south and Galilee to the north. The first-century historian Josephus set the Mediterranean Sea as its limit to the west, and the Jordan River as its limit to the east. Its territory largely corresponds to the biblical allotments of the tribe of Ephraim and the western half of Manasseh. It includes most of the region of the ancient Kingdom of Israel, which was north of the Kingdom of Judah. The border between Samaria and Judea is set at the latitude of Ramallah.
The Roman historian and senator Tacitus referred to Jesus, his execution by Pontius Pilate, and the existence of early Christians in Rome in his final work, Annals, book 15, chapter 44.
Herod Agrippa, also known as Herod II or Agrippa I, was the last Jewish king of Judea. He was a grandson of Herod the Great and the father of Herod Agrippa II, the last known king from the Herodian dynasty. He was acquaintance or friend of Roman emperors and even played crucial roles in internal Roman politics.
Herod Agrippa II, officially named Marcus Julius Agrippa and sometimes shortened to Agrippa, was the last ruler from the Herodian dynasty, reigning over territories outside of Judea as a Roman client. Agrippa II fled Jerusalem in 66, fearing the Jewish uprising and supported the Roman side in the First Jewish–Roman War.
Most scholars who study the historical Jesus and early Christianity believe that the canonical gospels and the life of Jesus must be viewed within their historical and cultural context, rather than purely in terms of Christian orthodoxy. They look at Second Temple Judaism, the tensions, trends, and changes in the region under the influence of Hellenism and the Roman occupation, and the Jewish factions of the time, seeing Jesus as a Jew in this environment; and the written New Testament as arising from a period of oral gospel traditions after his death.
Tiberius Julius Alexander was an equestrian governor and general in the Roman Empire. Born into a wealthy Jewish family of Alexandria but abandoning or neglecting the Jewish religion, he rose to become the 2nd procurator of Judea under Claudius. While Prefect of Egypt (66–69), he employed his legions against the Alexandrian Jews in a brutal response to ethnic violence, and was instrumental in the Emperor Vespasian's rise to power. In 70, he participated in the Siege of Jerusalem as Titus' second-in-command. He became the most powerful Jew of his age, and is ranked as one of the most prominent Jews in military history.
Antonius Felix was the 4th Roman procurator of Judea Province in 52–60, in succession to Ventidius Cumanus.
Herod Archelaus was the ethnarch of Samaria, Judea, and Idumea, including the cities Caesarea and Jaffa, for nine years. He was the son of Herod the Great and Malthace the Samaritan, brother of Herod Antipas, and half-brother of Herod II. Archelaus came to power after the death of his father Herod the Great in 4 BC, and ruled over one-half of the territorial dominion of his father. Archelaus was removed by the Roman emperor Augustus when Judaea province was formed under direct Roman rule, at the time of the Census of Quirinius.
Judaea was a Roman province which incorporated the regions of Judea, Samaria, and Idumea from 6 CE, extending over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Judea. The name Judaea, like the similar Judea, was derived from the Iron Age Kingdom of Judah, but the Roman province encompassed a much larger territory.
Gaius Ummidius Durmius Quadratus was a Roman senator of the Principate. He was the first member of the Ummidii to reach the office of consul in his family, or a homo novus. Quadratus is also known for his tenure as governor of Syria from c. 50 until his death.
The Herodian Tetrarchy was a regional division of a client state of Rome, formed following the death of Herod the Great in 4 BCE. The latter's client kingdom was divided between his sister Salome I and his sons Herod Archelaus, Herod Antipas, and Philip. Upon the deposition of Herod Archelaus in 6 CE, his territories were transformed into a Roman province. With the death of Salome I in 10 CE, her domain was also incorporated into a province.
Lucceius Albinus was the 6th Roman Procurator of Judea from 62 until 64 and the governor of Mauretania Tingitana from 64 until 69.
The procuratorial coinage of Roman Judaea was minted by the prefects and procurators of the province between AD 6 and 66 in only one denomination and size, the bronze prutah.
The Second Temple period or Post-Exilic period in Jewish history lasted approximately 600 years, during which the Second Temple existed. It started with the return to Zion and the construction of the Second Temple, while it ended with the First Jewish–Roman War and the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE.
The gens Ummidia was a Roman family which flourished during the first and second centuries. The first member of the gens to achieve prominence was Gaius Ummidius Durmius Quadratus, governor of Syria during the reigns of Claudius and Nero. The Ummidii held several consulships in the second century, and through the marriage of Gaius Ummidius Quadratus Annianus Verus they were related to the emperor Marcus Aurelius.
The history of the Jews in the Roman Empire traces the interaction of Jews and Romans during the period of the Roman Empire. A Jewish diaspora had migrated to Rome and to the territories of Roman Europe from the land of Israel, Anatolia, Babylon and Alexandria in response to economic hardship and incessant warfare over the land of Israel between the Ptolemaic and Seleucid empires from the 4th to the 1st centuries BCE. In Rome, Jewish communities thrived economically. Jews became a significant part of the Roman Empire's population in the first century CE, with some estimates as high as 7 million people; however, this estimation has been questioned.
The Samaritan revolts were a series of insurrections in Palaestina Prima province, launched by the Samaritans against the Eastern Roman Empire. The revolts were marked by great violence on both sides, and their brutal suppression at the hands of the Byzantines and their Ghassanid allies severely reduced the Samaritan population. The events irreversibly shifted the demographics of the region, making the Christians the only dominant group in the Palaestina Prima province for many decades onward.
Acts 23 is the twenty-third chapter of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It records the period of Paul's imprisonment in Jerusalem then in Caesarea. The book containing this chapter is anonymous but early Christian tradition uniformly affirmed that Luke composed this book as well as the Gospel of Luke.