Bible Synapse
Philippi
Site · 356 BC – 6th century AD · The early church
See it on the map and timeline
- Date
- 356 BC – 6th century AD (the city, from Philip II to its early Christian churches)
- Found
- Philippi, eastern Macedonia, Greece. Excavated by the French School at Athens from 1914 to 1937, then by the Archaeological Society of Athens, the Greek Archaeological Service and the University of Thessaloniki. Inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2016.
- Now
- At the site, Philippi, Greece
- Passages
- Acts 16:12–40, Philippians 1:1, 1 Thessalonians 2:2
What it is
The ruins of a walled city on the Via Egnatia, the Roman road across Macedonia, founded by Philip II in 356 BC. After the battle of Philippi in 42 BC it was refounded as a Roman colony. Excavations have uncovered a theatre, several large churches and the Roman forum, begun under Claudius and finished in the 2nd century. A mosaic inscription of Bishop Porphyrios, usually dated about AD 343, names a “basilica of Paul”.
How it connects to the Bible
Acts calls Philippi “a colony”, and Paul's accusers there complain of customs not lawful for them “being Romans”. The Roman forum and the many Latin inscriptions found at the site fit a Roman colony in a Greek-speaking province. Paul later wrote to the church there (Philippians 1:1), and the church of the 4th century remembered him with a basilica named after him.