Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Coele-Syria" in English language version.
Decapolis was so called from its ten Cities enumerated by Pliny (lib. 5. 18.) And with them he reckons up among others, the Tetrarchy of Abila in the same Decapolis : Which demonstrates the Abila Decapolis and Abila Lysaniæ to be the same Place. And tho'it cannot be denied, but that some of Pliny's ten Cities are not far distant from that near Jordan ; yet it doth not appear that ever this other had the Title of a Tetrarchy. Here it is to be observed, that what Pliny calls Decapolis, Ptolemy makes his Cœle-Syria ; and the Cœle-Syria of Pliny, is that Part of Syria about Aleppo, formerly call'd Chalcidene, Cyrrhistice, &c.
Cœlosyria properly so called, lay between Libanus and Antilibanus, and was thence called Cœlosyria, or the Hollow Syria. Its principal cities were Heliopolis, Abila, Damascus and Laodicea. This geographer styles Abila Abila Lysaniœ, which agrees with St. Luke's division of the tetrarchy, chap iii. 1. From Abila, the neighbouring country took the name of Abilene.
The governor of Syria retained the civil administration of the whole large province undiminished, and held for long alone in all Asia a command of the first rank. [...] It was only in the course of the second century that a diminution of his prerogatives occurred, when Hadrian took one of the four legions from the governor of Syria and handed it over to the governor of Palestine. It was Severus who at length withdrew the first place in the Roman military hierarchy from the Syrian governor. After having subdued the province —which had wished at that time to make Niger emperor, as it had formerly done with its governor Vespasian —amidst resistance from the capital Antioch in particular, he ordained its partition into a northern and a southern half, and gave to the governor of the former, which was called Coele-Syria, two legions, to the governor of the latter, the province of Syro-Phoenicia, one [legion].
In Syria, taken largely, there were many small provinces as Coelesyria, which the Latins call Syria Cava, because it lay in that fruitful valley between the mountains of Libanus and Anti-Libanus, in which the famous cities of Antioch, Laodicea, Apamea, with many others were seated.)
80. Having marched to Pelusium Ptolemy made his first halt in that town; and having been there joined by the stragglers, and having given out their rations of corn to his men, he got the army in motion, and led them by a line of march which goes through the waterless region skirting Mount Casius and the Marshes.(Called Barathra, See Strabo, 17, 1, 21.) On the fifth day's march he reached his destination, and pitched his camp a distance of fifty stades from Rhaphia, which is the first city of Coele-Syria towards Egypt.
Strabo below, c. ii. § 21, refers to this ancient division, when he says that the name Coele-Syria extends to the whole country as far as Egypt and Arabia, although in its peculiar acceptation it applied only to the valley between Libanus and Antilibanus.
4. 12. Syria, was given to Laomedon of Mytilene. Curt. 10. 10. 2; Diod. 18. 3. 1; Arr. Succ. 1. 5; Dexippus, FGrH 100 F 8 §2. Syria here is Coele-Syria (Hollow Syria), in effect, the old Persian satrapy of Abarnahara ('the land beyond the river'; cf. Lehmann-Haupt §26; cf. §§129 ff). By strict definition, 'Hollow Syria' was the area between Lebanon and Antilebanon, though it came to represent the stretch from the Orontes to the Dead Sea. Strabo 16. 2. 16 C755 shows that it includes Damascus and the Jordan River, and that its northern and southern reaches are roughly parallel with Tripolis and Sidon respectively. Since the satrapy lists do not include a separate ruler for Phoenicia, we must conclude that Coele-Syria in the broad sense includes Phoenica as well; see also Pliny, HN 5. 13. 66-7.
The text is in bad shape and has been restored as follows: "Doros (Dor), a city of Sidonioi, <Ioppe (Jaffa), a city;> they say it was here that Androm<eda> was <ex>posed <to the monster. Aska>lon, a city of Tyrioi and a royal seat. Her<e is the boundary of Koile> (Hollow) Syria." (Shipley 2011, Pseudo-Skylax's Periplous, 104,3) Apparently the source lists the major cities on the Palestinian coast, apart from Gaza.
In 301 BCE, Judaea was incorporated into the Ptolemaic province of Coele-Syria. Then in 200 BCE, the Seleucids conquered Coele-Syria.
80. Ptolemy, marching on Pelusium, made his first halt at that city, and after picking up stragglers and serving out rations to his men moved on marching through the desert and skirting Mount Casius and the marshes called Barathra. Reaching the spot he was bound for on the fifth day he encamped at a distance of fifty stades from Raphia, (Modern Rafah at the border of Egypt and Israel, north of Rhinocolara (El Arish)) which is the first city of Coele-Syria on the Egyptian side after Rhinocolura.
Coelesyria, some write it conjoined as here, others, as the Greeks, Coele Syria, separate, which seems the juster way, because Pliny not only separates these words, but also simply says, Coele, an ancient inscription. Authors differ much in settling its limits, some extending, and others contracting, them too much: Strabo says, Coele Syria Propria is defined by Libanus and Anti-libanus, running parallel to each other. Now if we determine the limits of these two mountains, we shall go near to settle those of Coele Syria. They both begin a little above the sea; Libanus near Tripolis; chiefly against the spot called Dei Facies: Antilibanus at Sidon; but they terminate near the mountains of Arabia, above the territory of Damascus, and near the mountains of the Trachonitis, and there they terminate in other mountains, Strabo.
Or the "Hollow" Syria. This was properly the name given, after the Macedonian conquest, to the great valley between the two great ranges of Mount Lebanon, in the south of Syria, bordering upon Phœnicia on the west, and Palestine on the south. In the wars between the Ptolemies and the Seleucidæ, the name was applied to the whole of the southern portion of Syria, which became subject for some time to the kings of Egypt; but under the Romans, it was confined to Cœlesyria proper with the district east of Anti-Libanus, about Damascus, and a portion of Palestine east of Jordan.
On Coele-Syria as a geographic designation, see Millar, Roman Near East, pp. 121-23, and .42 with bibliography cited there, including E. Bickerman, "La Coelé-Syria: Notes de géographie historique," RB 54 (1947): 256. The term floated; it did not have the connotations in antiquity that it now has. Most helpful is Strabo, Geog. 16.2.16-22: in 16-20 he discusses Coele-Syria proper, the area between the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon Mountains; then in 21 he says the whole area between Seleucia (i.e., Syria) and Egypt-Arabia is called Coele-Syria, pointing out that "the country marked off by the Libanus and the Antilibanus is called by that name in a special sense" (see also 22). He is not confused but reports differing contemporary usages.
When then [Moses] he received the supreme authority, with the good will of all his subjects, God himself being the regulator and approver of all his actions, he conducted his people as a colony into Phoenicia, and into the hollow Syria (Coele-syria), and Palestine, which was at that time called the land of the Canaanites, the borders of which country were three days' journey distant from Egypt.
62. Syria holds a broad expanse of the littoral, as well as lands that extend rather broadly into the interior, and it is designated by different names in different places. For example, it is called Coele, Mesopotamia, Judaea, Commagene, and Sophene. 63. It is Palestine at the point where Syria abuts the Arabs, then Phoenicia, and then—where it reaches Cilicia—Antiochia. [...] 64. In Palestine, however, is Gaza, a mighty and well fortified city.
Ityraeos taxi torquentur in arcus.
Chapter XII. Syria, Palestine, Phœnicè. Near the Coast is Syria, a Region which in Times past was the chiefest of Lands, and distinguished by many Names.
[Year] 46 [BCE] Herod (the Great) made governor of all Coele-Syria by Sextus Caesar, governor of Syria.
Antiochus made a friendship and league with Ptolemy, (Ptolemy V., Epiphanes 205-181 B.C.) and gave him his daughter Cleopatra in marriage, and yielded up to him Cœle-Syria and Samaria and Judæa and Phœnicia by way of dowry.
The problem of indicating precise ancient boundaries in Transjordan is difficult and complex and varies according to the time period under discussion. After the creation of the Roman province of Arabia in 106 A.D. Gerasa and Philadelphia were included in it. Nonetheless, Ptolemy—who was writing in the second century A.D. but did not record places by Roman provinces—described them as being in (the local geographical unit of) Coele Syria (5.14.18). Furthermore, Philadelphia continued to describe itself on its coins and in inscriptions of the second and third centuries A.D. as being a city of Coele Syria; see above, Philadelphia, n. 9. As for the boundaries of the new province, the northern frontier extended to a little beyond the north of Bostra and east; the western border ran somewhat east of the Jordan River valley and the Dead Sea but west of the city of Madaba (see M. Sartre, Trois ét., 17-75; Bowersock, ZPE5, [1970] 37-39; id., JRS61 [1971] 236-42; and especially id.. Arabia, 90-109). Gadara in Peraea is identified today with es-Salt near Tell Jadur, a place that is near the western boundary of the province of Arabia. And this region could have been described by Stephanos as being located "between Coele Syria and Arabia."
In 194 A.D. The emperor Septimus Severus divided the province of Syria and made the northern part into a separate province called Coele Syria.
Quod si objeceris terram repromissionis dici, quae in Numerorum volumine continetur (Cap. 34), a meridie maris Salinarum per Sina et Cades-Barne, usque ad torrentem Aegypti, qui juxta Rhinocoruram mari magno influit; et ab occidente ipsum mare, quod Palaestinae, Phoenici, Syriae Coeles, Ciliciaeque pertenditur; ab aquilone Taurum montem et Zephyrium usque Emath, quae appellatur Epiphania Syriae; ad orientem vero per Antiochiam et lacum Cenereth, quae nunc Tiberias appellatur, et Jordanem, qui mari influit Salinarum, quod nunc Mortuum dicitur.
LIBANIUS was born at Antioch, the capital of Coele Syria as it is called. This city was founded by Seleucus surnamed Nicator. Libanius came of a noble family and ranked among the first citizens.
The toponym "Coele Syria" (Κοίλη Συρία) has been used by ancient authors to designate various regions of the Levant. The term appeared for the first time in Greek language at the beginning of the fourth century BCE. Schalit (1954) 68-70 and Sartre (1988) 22, 26 among others have convincingly argued that at that time "Coele Syria" signified "the whole of Syria" from the Levantine coast in the west to the river Euphrates in the east covering the entire area of the old Achaemenid satrapy called kul ʿawar nahara ("everything beyond the river"). The word Κοίλη in this context does thus not mean "hollow" (κοῖλος), but "whole", and originates probably as a Greek transliteration from the Aramaic word "kul". As a result of administrative changes in the Levant during the following two and a half centuries, the toponym "Coele Syria" acquired additional narrower meanings, whereby it was used to refer to different parts of Syria. Throughout antiquity, though, it never seems to have lost its original meaning.
Libanius was born at Antioch, the capital of Coele Syria as it is called. This city was founded by Seleucus surnamed Nicator
I shall tell how Antiochus (Antiochus III the Great) and Ptolemy Philopator (Ptolemy IV Philopator) first quarreled and finally went to war with each other for the possession of Coele-Syria. (Syrian Wars 219–217 BCE) [...] (Now I come to) the disturbances in Egypt; (The attempted partition of the dominions of Ptolemy V Epiphanes c.204) how, after the death of King Ptolemy (IV), Antiochus and Philip (Philip V of Macedon) entered into a compact for the partition of the dominions of that monarch's infant son, I shall describe their treacherous dealings. Philip laying hands upon; the islands of the Aegean and Caria and Samos. Antiochus upon; Coele-Syria and Phoenicia.
Plin. Nat. 5.13, CHAP. 13. (12.)—SYRIA.
