Simon ben Koseba or Cosiba (; died 135 CE), commonly known as Bar Kokhba (), was a Jewish military leader who led the Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire in 132 CE. The revolt established a three-year-long independent Jewish state in which Bar Kokhba ruled as nasi ("prince"). Some of the rabbinic scholars in his time imagined him to be the long-expected Messiah. Bar Kokhba was killed by the Romans in the fortified town of Betar. Name Documented name Documents discovered in the 20th century in the Cave of Letters give his original name, with variations: Simeon bar Kosevah (), Bar Kosevaʾ‎ () or Ben Kosevaʾ‎ (). It is probable that his original name was Bar Koseba. The name may indicate that his father or his place of origin was named Koseva(h), with Khirbet Kuwayzibah being a likely nominee for identification; Others, namely Emil Schürer, think the surname may have been an indication of his place of birth, in the village known as Chozeba (maybe Chezib) but might as well be a general family name. Nicknames During the revolt, the Jewish sage Rabbi Akiva regarded Simon as the Jewish messiah; the Talmud records his statement that the Star Prophecy verse from Numbers 24:17: "There shall come a star out of Jacob" referred to him, based on identification of the Hebrew word for star, kokhav, and his name, bar Kozeva. The name Bar Kokhba, which references this statement of Akiva, does not appear in the Talmud, but only in ecclesiastical sources, until the 16th century. The Jerusalem Talmud (Taanit 4:5) mentions him by the name of Bar Kozeva. Revolt leader Background Despite the devastation wrought by the Romans during the First Jewish–Roman War (66–73 CE), which left the population and countryside in ruins, a series of laws passed by Roman Emperors provided the incentive for the second rebellion. Based on the delineation of years in Eusebius' Chronicon (whose Latin translation is known as the Chronicle of Jerome) the Jewish revolt began under the Roman governor Tineius (Tynius) Rufus in the 16th year of Hadrian's reign, or what was equivalent to the 4th year of the 227th Olympiad. Hadrian sent an army to crush the resistance, but it faced a strong opponent, since Bar Kokhba, as the recognised leader of Israel, punished any Jew who refused to join his ranks. Two and a half years later, after the war had ended,