CYRENE. - Ancient and most important city of Cyrenaica, from which the region took its name, situated on the edge of the plateau at 622 m. above the sea and 16 km. from the coast.
Various legends about the origin of C. reported by Herodotus (IV, 164) agree in attributing its foundation to a Doric colony of Therans between 650 and 640. From the 3rd century B.C. it remained, apart from brief interruptions, under the dominion of the Ptolemies, until the Roman age. From the time of Ptolemy I Soter numerous Jews settled there (Fl. Josephus, Antiq. Ind., XIV, 7, 2; XVI, 6, 15; Bell. Ind., II, 14, 6; I Mach. 15, 23).
The historian Jason (II Mach. 2, 23), and later Simon (Mt. 27, 32; Mk. 15, 21), pressed into carrying the cross of Jesus, were from C. At the first Christian Pentecost Jews from Cyrenaica were present at the speech of Peter (Act. 2, 10); they possessed in Jerusalem a synagogue of their own, whose members took part in the condemnation and martyrdom of St. Stephen (Act. 6, 9). Some converted Hellenistic Jews "Cyprists and Cyrenians," who had escaped the persecution that raged after the death of St. Stephen, evangelized Greek pagans in Antioch (Act. 11, 20), of whose community Lucius the Cyrenian was a distinguished member. Later C. also had its martyrs; under the bishop Synesius (v.) it was invaded by the barbarian Macetae and Ausuriani, until in 642 it fell under the dominion of the Arabs.
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Donato Baldi