General Notes

Balian, Constable to the Count of Jaffa (Turton states his father Hugues was 1st Count of Jaffa); in 1141 he "inherited" the castle of Yebna, from which his family took the Frenchified name, Ibelin.

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JAMNIA (ëIauvia or ëlauveta), the Greek form of the Hebrew name Jabneel -  i.e. "God causeth to build" (Josh. xv. 11) - or Jabneh (2 Chron. xxvi. 6), the modern Arabic YEBNA, a town of Palestine, on the border between Dan and Judah, situated 13 m. S. of Jaffa, and 4 m. E. of the seashore. The modern village stands on an isolated sandy hillock, surrounded by gardens with olives to the north and sand-dunes to the west. It contains a small crusadersí church, now a mosque. Jamnia belonged to the Philistines, and Uzziah of Judah is said to have taken it (2 Chron. xxvi. 6). In Maccabean times Joseph and Azarias attacked it unsuccessfully (I Macc. v. 55ó62; 2 Macc. xii. 8 seq. is untrustworthy). Alexander Jannaeus subdued it, and under Pompey it became Roman. It changed hands several times, is mentioned by Strabo (xvi. 2) as being once very populous, and in the Jewish war was taken by Vespasian. The population was mainly Jewish (Philo, Leg. ad Gaium, ß 30), and the town is principally famous as having been the seat of the Sanhedrin and the religious centre of Judaism from A.D. 70 to 135. It sent a bishop to Nicaea in 325.

In 1144 a crusaders fortress was built on the hill, which is often mentioned under the name Ibelin. There was also a Jabneel in Lower Galile (Josh. xix. 33), called later Caphar Yama, the present village Yemma, 8 m. S. of Tiberias; and another fortress in Uppe:  [http://38.1911encyclopedia.org/J/JA/JAMNIA.htm]