Emmaus, due to its strategic position in Palestine, has played an important administrative, military and economic role in history.

The first mention of Emmaus occurs in the First Book of Maccabees, chapters 3-4, in the context of Judas the Maccabee’s wars against the Greeks (second century BCE).

Emmaus during the Hasmonean period had become a regional administrative center (toparchy) in the Ayalon Valley.

Josephus Flavius, who mentions Emmaus in his writings several times, speaks about the destruction of Emmaus by the Romans in the year 4 BCE.

Romans and Samaritans in the first half of the second century CE had settled in Emmaus after the defeat of the Bar-Kochba’s revolt.

A Christian scholar and writer born in Jerusalem, Julius Africanus, lives in Emmaus in the early third century CE.

He may have served in 195 under Septimius Severus against the Osrhoenians.

He goes on an embassy to the emperor Severus Alexander to ask for the restoration of Emmaus, which had fallen into ruins.

His mission succeeds, and Emmaus is henceforward known as Nicopolis.

An epidemic disease breaks out in Emmaus (Imwas) in Palestine, striking the city and the military camps of the Muslim Arabs, killing most of its population (probably an estimated twenty-five thousand people).

The Plague of Emmaus causes the death of many prominent companions of Muhammad, drawn from the muhajirun or "migrants"—those who had faith in Muhammad when he began to preach in Mecca who fled with him when he was persecuted there—the ansar—people of Medina who welcomed Muhammad and his companions and stood as their protectors, and the badriyun, who had fought at the Battle of Badr.