I am not sure if this is a Compass bug, but the following seems a bit suspicious. So, feel free to close this if I am off-track. I am seeing an IllegalArgumentException when using cascade annotations in @SearchableComponent where the component itself has the root = false. It works fine, if root = true. A description of the problem follows. TopLinkEssentialsJpaEntityLifeCycleInjector has the following line (117): if (gps.hasMappingForEntityForMirror(mappedClass, CascadeMapping.Cascade.ALL)) In other words, it passes Cascade.ALL that will always result in an exception unless the entity has root = false. The reason is that AbstractRefAliasMapping#shouldCascade has the following: public boolean shouldCascade(Cascade cascade) { if (cascades == null) { return false; } if (cascade == Cascade.CREATE) { return shouldCascadeCreate(); } else if (cascade == Cascade.SAVE) { return shouldCascadeSave(); } else if (cascade == Cascade.DELETE) { return shouldCascadeDelete(); } else { throw new IllegalArgumentException("Should cascade can't handle [" + cascade + "]"); } } So, it cannot handle Cascade.ALL, but that's what TopLinkEssentialsJpaEntityLifeCycleInjector has passed. (Note that it doesn't matter what cascades I define for the @SearchableComponent. As long as there is a single cascade, this will happen). The stack trace follows: exception is java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Should cascade can't handle [ALL] Caused by: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Should cascade can't handle [ALL] at org.compass.core.mapping.osem.AbstractRefAliasMapping.shouldCascade(AbstractRefAliasMapping.java:188) at org.compass.core.mapping.AbstractResourceMapping.operationAllowed(AbstractResourceMapping.java:205) at org.compass.gps.impl.AbstractCompassGps.hasMappingForEntity(AbstractCompassGps.java:86) at org.compass.gps.impl.SingleCompassGps.hasMappingForEntityForMirror(SingleCompassGps.java:172) at org.compass.gps.device.jpa.lifecycle.TopLinkEssentialsJpaEntityLifecycleInjector.injectLifecycle(TopLinkEssentialsJpaEntityLifecycleInjector.java:117) at org.compass.gps.device.jpa.JpaGpsDevice.doStart(JpaGpsDevice.java:170) at org.compass.gps.device.AbstractGpsDevice.start(AbstractGpsDevice.java:124) at org.compass.gps.device.support.parallel.AbstractParallelGpsDevice.start(AbstractParallelGpsDevice.java:66) at org.compass.gps.device.AbstractGpsDeviceWrapper.start(AbstractGpsDeviceWrapper.java:64) at org.compass.gps.impl.AbstractCompassGps.start(AbstractCompassGps.java:164) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39) at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25) at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:597) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.invokeCustomInitMethod(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:1160) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.invokeInitMethods(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:1122) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.initializeBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:1085) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:429) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory$1.getObject(AbstractBeanFactory.java:250) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.getSingleton(DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.java:141) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory.getBean(AbstractBeanFactory.java:247) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory.getBean(AbstractBeanFactory.java:161) at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultListableBeanFactory.preInstantiateSingletons(DefaultListableBeanFactory.java:273) at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.refresh(AbstractApplicationContext.java:346) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39) at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25) at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:597) at org.springframework.test.jpa.AbstractJpaTests.runBare(AbstractJpaTests.java:214) at junit.framework.TestResult$1.protect(TestResult.java:110) at junit.framework.TestResult.runProtected(TestResult.java:128) at junit.framework.TestResult.run(TestResult.java:113) at junit.framework.TestCase.run(TestCase.java:120) at junit.framework.TestSuite.runTest(TestSuite.java:228) at junit.framework.TestSuite.run(TestSuite.java:223) at org.junit.internal.runners.OldTestClassRunner.run(OldTestClassRunner.java:35) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit4.runner.JUnit4TestReference.run(JUnit4TestReference.java:38) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.TestExecution.run(TestExecution.java:38) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.runTests(RemoteTestRunner.java:460) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.runTests(RemoteTestRunner.java:673) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.run(RemoteTestRunner.java:386) at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.main(RemoteTestRunner.java:196)