Sepphoris, Tzippori, was known as the jewel of the Galilee and was one of the capital cities of the Galilee. Just prior to the Bar Kokhba revolt, the city's name was changed to Diocaesarea. Following the Bar Kokhba revolt in 132–135, many Jewish refugees from devastated Judea settled there, turning it into a center of Jewish religious and spiritual life in the Galilee. Rabbi Yehuda Hanasi, one of the compilers of the Mishnah, a commentary on the Torah, moved to Tzippori, along with the Sanhedrin, the highest Jewish religious court. One of the more exciting discoveries that we made at Sepphoris was a magnificent Roman villa with a gorgeous, mosaic known as the "Mona Lisa of the Galilee", an extraordinary depiction in stone of a beautiful woman of Roman antiquity.
