Bar Kokhba Letters

In 1951–1952 Bedouin and archaeologists found documents from the revolt in caves of Wadi Murabba'at, and in 1960–1961 Yigael Yadin's team found more in the Cave of Letters in Nahal Hever, where refugees had hidden and died. They include letters from Shimon bar Kosiba himself to his commanders at Ein Gedi, Yehonatan bar Ba'ayan and Masabala bar Shimon, in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. One asks them to send palm branches, citrons, myrtles and willows for Sukkot; others threaten to put in fetters men who ignored his orders.

The finds revealed the leader's real name, Bar Kosiba, and showed a working administration that leased land in the name of "Shimon ben Kosiba, Nasi of Israel" and dated documents by the years of "the Redemption of Israel." The same cave held the archive of Babatha, a Jewish woman from Mahoza at the south end of the Dead Sea, with her marriage contract and court papers from 94 to 132. Together they are the richest written record of daily life in Judea at the time of the revolt.