A casual glance at the collection of studies in this book will undoubtedly cause the reader to wonder about their eclectic nature. At first, there appears to be no connection between one study and the next. However, deeper observation of the way each study was composed and the dynamic of how one study led to another reveals the logical and developental thread that runs through them all. The basic questions at the core of this book are: Where did the thousands of Jews who populated Judea after the destruction of the SecondTemple and the Bar -Kokhba Revolt go, and was the fate of the areas abandonedby the large Jewish population that lived there before the destruction of the second Temple?