Hadrian spends the years 125 to 127…

Sun is recalled to the capital in 128, but continues to lack actual influence to effect reforms.

Another major influence on Emperor Shun is his wet nurse Song E, who is described as a kind woman who, however, also lacks ability, and as she is effectively acting in the stead of an empress dowager, she is not much actual help to Emperor Shun.

Still, the period of Emperor Shun’s rule is generally one during which the empire rests from previous periods of political turmoil.

Although the emperor lacks ability, and corruption continues to run rampant, his personal kindness allows the people a measure of peace.

Ban Yong, during the attack on Karashahr, had been late in making his planned rendezvous with Zhang Lang.

Punished by recall and imprisonment, he is later pardoned and dies in 128 among his family.

The Pantheon, a harmonious balance of both Roman engineering genius and Greek aesthetics, is completed in 128.

A a rectangular forum in front of the temple softens the ungainly juxtaposition of its three sections: an immense round temple, covered by a single hemispherical dome, fronted by a transitional block and a traditional temple portico of eight Corinthian columns carrying a triangular pediment.

Deceptive in its simple appearance, the Pantheon consists of a circular drum carrying a hemispherical dome with an inside diameter of 142 feet (43.2 meters).

The drum and dome, made of solid monolithic concrete, are reinforced with bands of vitreous tile, with relieving arches incorporated in the concrete to collect and distribute the vertical gravity loads to the drum.

A series of alternately rectangular and curved niches or recesses hollow out the drum’s 20 foot-thick (6.1 meter) wall, thus transforming the drum into a series of massive radial buttresses that reduce its deadweight without decreasing its strength.

The density of the filler in the concrete, from pumice in the upper dome to tufa in the middle sections and dense basalt in the foundations, lessens the weight of the upper sections, and thus the magnitude of the thrusts.

The curve of the dome’s inner surface, if extended to the floor, would just "kiss" the floor; thus containing, in symbolic reference to the temple's dedication to all the gods in the sphere of the heavens, a truly perfect sphere.

Deep coffers radiate down from the thirty foot-diameter (9.1 meter) central oculus—the building’s only window—to lessen the visually compressive effect of the dome on the inside.

Because the oculus is open to the sky, the floor is slightly concave with a central drain.

Ornamented by marble revetments, mosaics, and stuccowork, the temple features enormous bronze doors twenty-four feet (seven meters) high (the largest Roman doors to survive in place and remain in use).

The Jewish population in Babylonia numbers between eight hundred thousand and one million two hundred thousand by around 130, comprising ten to twelve percent of the entire population.

The Babylonian Jews are semiautonomous and enjoy full freedom of religion.

Papias, bishop of Hierapolis in Anatolia and (by tradition) a disciple of Saint John the Apostle and a companion of Saint Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, writes Explanations of the Sayings of the Lord, a work in five books produced around 130 that contains many oral traditions and legends of apostolic times. (The work survives only in fragments preserved by Eusebius of Caesarea and Irenaeus of Lyon.)

Hadrian has a close relationship with a Bithynian Greek youth, Antinous, which is most likely sexual.

Deeply saddened in 130 CE after Antinous drowns, Hadrian, founds the Egyptian city of Antinopolis in his memory, and has Antinous deified—an unprecedented honor for one not of the ruling family.

The cult of Antinous is to become very popular in the Greek-speaking world.

It has been suggested that Hadrian created the cult as a political move to reconcile the Greek-speaking East to Roman rule.

Hadrian writes poetry in both Latin and Greek; one of the few surviving examples is a Latin poem he reportedly composes on his deathbed.

He also writes an autobiography—not, apparently, a work of great length or revelation, but designed to squelch various rumors or explain his various actions.

Hadrian from the time of his youth according to one source had been a passionate hunter, founding and dedicated a city In northwest Asia to commemorate a she-bear he had killed.

It is documented that in Egypt he and his beloved Antinous killed a lion.

Eight reliefs in Rome featuring Hadrian in different stages of hunting decorate a building that began as a monument celebrating a kill.

Apollodorus of Damascus is widely credited as the architect of the Pantheon.

From well before his reign, Hadrian had displayed a keen interest in architecture, but it seems that his eagerness was not always well received.

According to Dio Cassius, when Trajan, predecessor to Hadrian, consulted Apollodorus about an architectural problem, Hadrian interrupted to give advice, to which Apollodorus replied, "Go away and draw your pumpkins.

You know nothing about these problems."

"Pumpkins" refers to Hadrian's drawings of domes like the Serapeum in his villa.

According to Dio Cassius (lxix.

4), Apollodorus later criticized Hadrian's plans for the Temple of Venus in Rome On the accession of Hadrian, Apollodorus was banished and, shortly afterwards, being charged with imaginary crimes, put to death in 130.

The story about Apollodorus' death demonstrates the persistent hostility felt towards Hadrian in senatorial circles long after his reign, for if Dio included it in his history, he must have believed it.

Many since have taken Dio's anecdote at face value, but there is much in this story that does not add up and many scholars dismiss its historicity altogether.

In addition to his architectural legacy, Apollodorus leaves several technical treatises (none survive), including one on Siege Engines, which is dedicated to Hadrian.

Juvenal, in his Satire 10, passionately essays on the vanity of all human wishes regardless of place or time.

(A later account that Juvenal suffers exile for his outspokenness and ends his days wretchedly in Egypt, the victim of Emperor Hadrian's malevolence, is possibly an apocryphal echo of the fate of Ovid a century before.)

Hadrian, a versatile emperor, likes to demonstrate knowledge of all intellectual and artistic fields.

Above all, he patronizes the arts: Hadrian's Villa at Tibur (Tivoli) is the greatest Roman example of an Alexandrian garden, recreating a sacred landscape, ultimately lost in large part to the despoliation of the ruins by the Cardinal d'Este, who will have much of the marble removed to build Villa d'Este.

Emperor Shun intends to create an empress, and not wanting to play favorites, he considers drawing lots before the gods to determine who should be the empress.

In 131, after his officials discourage him from this action, he finally selects one of his consorts, Liang Na, as the one he considers most virtuous and most rational.

The Roman authorities had taken measures in 70 CE to suppress the rebellious province of Iuadea after the failed Great Jewish Revolt, installing a praetor instead of a procurator as a governor and stationing in Jerusalem an entire legion, the X Fretensis.

The Council at Yavne, as the Great Revolt had resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem, provides spiritual guidance for the Jewish nation, both in Judea and throughout the Jewish Diaspora.

The tensions continued to build, resulting in the Kitos War, the second large-scale Jewish insurrection in the Eastern Mediterranean, the final stages of which had been fought in Judaea.

Jerusalem had been partially repopulated by 130.

Emperor Hadrian, although more cautious in his foreign policy than his imperialistic predecessor Trajan, is notably less benevolent in his attitude toward the Jews than Rome's other subject peoples.

During his tour in 131 of the Eastern Empire, Hadrian decides upon a policy of Hellenization to integrate the Jews into the empire.

Visiting the ruins of the temple, Hadrian is at first sympathetic towards the Jews and promises to rebuild the temple, but the Jews feel betrayed when they find out that his intentions are to build a temple dedicated to Jupiter upon the ruins of the Second Temple.

An additional legion, the VI Ferrata, is stationed in the province to maintain order, and the works commence in 131 CE after the governor of Judaea, Tineius Rufus, performs the foundation ceremony of Aelia Capitolina, the city’s projected new name.

"Plowing up the Temple" is a religious offense that turns many Jews against the Roman authorities.

The tensions grow higher when Hadrian abolishes circumcision (brit milah), which he, a Hellenist, views as mutilation. (The ban is later revoked, but only for the Jews).