Pompey occupied and annexed areas of today’s Turkey, Syria and Lebanon. This resulted in the creation of the Roman province of Syria in the year 64 BC. Roman Syria is one of the early conquests of the Roman Republic era.
Syrian Antioch was the capital city of Roman Syria. Syrian Antioch was one of the most crowded cities of the Roman Empire, reaching half a million population under the rule of Emperor Augustus. Even tough a small part of the Roman Syria was in today’s Turkey, still the capital city is still alive and called Antakya today.
Following the split of the Roman Empire by the emperor Diocletian, Roman Syria shrank in size. Eventually the capital city became a part of Asia Minor during Byzantine era and the rest of the Roman Syria started to be occupied by Arabic tribes.
