In the collective memory of the Jews, Caesarea is associated with the Bar Kokhba revolt, which broke out in 132 in protest of Hadrian's plan to make Jerusalem a pagan colony. The insurgents and the sages that presided over the lives of the Jewish communities in Palestine who took their side used a tangled network of tunnels and caves to engage in actual guerrilla warfare against the Romans. Dio Cassius, the historian, allows us to imagine their tenacity and the consequent cruelty of the repression:

The Bar Kokhba Revolt

In the beginning, the Romans were not worried about the insurgents. But little by little, the disturbances spread to all of Judea. The Jews rose in rebellion throughout the country, inflicting increasingly heavy losses on the Romans, sometimes resorting to ruse, sometimes to all out war. People from other nations, attracted by the pillage, threatened to join them. The entire world was seething. Finally, Hadrian dispatched his greatest generals to fight them. The most famous was Julius Severus, the governor of Brittany. Initially, the latter did not risk openly attacking the insurgents because of their great numbers and the intensity of their desperation. Instead, he preferred to undertake isolating them, forcing them to withdraw to their strongholds and cutting off their provisions. Thus, he succeeded, slowly but surely, to weaken and destroy them. Few Jews survived. Julius Severus seized about fifty of their best fortresses; 985 of their most important villages were reduced to ruins; 580,000 men died in ambushes and in battles. The numbers of those that died of starvation, that were victims of epidemics or that were burned to death cannot be determined. Almost all of Judea was devastated

Dio Cassius, History, LXIX, 12

In 135, Betar, the last bastion of the revolt, fell. The Romans eliminated the final pockets of resistance and executed the religious leaders. In Caesarea, ten sages, including the illustrious Rabbi Akiva, were tortured and burned alive. In its particular manner, the Talmudic text preserves the memory of their martyrdom, recounting that of Rabbi Hananiah ben Teradion as follows:

The martyrdom of Ben Teradion

Hananiah ben Teradion was deeply immersed in the study of the Torah when the guards arrived to take him. Surprised to find him studying, they exclaimed: " Don't you know that you have been condemned to be burnt alive? - The work of the Eternal is perfect, he replied, and His ways are just " At the moment that they seized him, his daughter burst into tears: " Why do you cry, my daughter? asked the Rabbi. - I cry, above all, for the Torah that will burn with you. - The Torah is fire and no fire can consume fire. "The Romans wrapped the Rabbi in the Torah scroll itself and piled wood around him. Then they set the stake on fire. They had previously applied drenched pieces of cotton cloth against his heart to prolong his agony. His disciples asked him:Master, what do you see?
I see the parchment (of the Torah scroll) being consumed and the letters taking flight.
Master, open your mouth and let the flames overcome you.
Only God Who gives souls can take mine; I cannot hasten its departure.The executioner then asked the Rabbi:
If I stir up the fire and remove the pieces of cloth, will you take me (with you) to the eternal world?
That, I can do.
Swear it, insisted the Roman.
I swear.
The executioner removed the cloths from the Rabbi and stirred up the fire. Soon after, the latter's soul departed and the executioner threw himself into the flames. Then, a soft voice from the sky announced: Hananiah ben Teradion and his executioner have been summoned to the world to come.

Commenting on this with tears in his eyes, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi declared:
For some, it only takes an instant to secure eternal life; for others, it takes many long years.

TB, Avodah Zarah 17b