Migration
Settlement in Byzantine Greece
← View on the mapWhy it happened
Jews were established across Asia Minor and the Aegean—Antiochus III settled families in Lydia and Phrygia—and spread west into Roman Greece for trade and settlement, since forced dislocation 'cannot explain more than a fraction of the eventual diaspora.'12
The migration
Greek-speaking Jewish settlement was old: an Oropos manumission names 'Moschos, son of Moschion the Jew' around 300–250 BCE,3 and organized communities existed by roughly 400 BCE.4 From strongholds in Asia Minor—Sardis being 'the largest Jewish site known from antiquity'5—Jewish immigrants 'flooded Hellenist cities along the Aegean Coast and the Greek mainland.'4 By the first century CE, Paul 'found well-established Jewish communities in Thessaloniki, Veroia, Athens, Corinth, and other towns,'4 with others at Sparta, Delos, Rhodes, Crete, Boeotia and Argos.4 Roman decrees let them 'follow their ancestral laws.'6 The Jews of these communities 'were called Romaniot,'4 translated their prayers into Greek written in Hebrew letters,4 and became 'the oldest Jewish community in Europe.'7
Sources
- BFlavius Josephus. 94. Jewish Antiquities, Book XII (trans. William Whiston). Perseus / University of Chicago (Whiston translation) link
- BErich S. Gruen. 2002. Diaspora: Jews amidst Greeks and Romans. Harvard University Press 2–3.
- BDavid M. Lewis. 2002. Selected Papers in Greek and Near Eastern History. Cambridge University Press 381. link
- CJewish Virtual Library. 2024. Greece Virtual Jewish History Tour. Jewish Virtual Library link
- AAndrew R. Seager. 1972. The Building History of the Sardis Synagogue. American Journal of Archaeology 76 425–435. doi:10.2307/502875
- BFlavius Josephus. 94. Jewish Antiquities, Book XIV (trans. William Whiston). Perseus / University of Chicago (Whiston translation) link
- CWikipedia contributors. 2026. Romaniote Jews. Wikipedia link