Bible Synapse
Thyatira
Site · c. 290 BC – Byzantine period · The early church · also called Thyateira, Akhisar
See it on the map and timeline
- Date
- c. 290 BC – Byzantine period (the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine city)
- Found
- Akhisar, Manisa Province, Turkey. Most of the ancient city lies under modern Akhisar. A site in the town centre known as Tepe Mezarlığı (Hill Cemetery) shows excavated remains.
- Now
- At the site, Akhisar, Turkey
- Passages
- Acts 16:14, Revelation 1:11, Revelation 2:18–29
What it is
A Lydian town refounded as a Greek city under the Seleucid kings around 290 BC, now covered by modern Akhisar. Only small areas have been dug; the remains on view include part of a colonnaded street and the walls of a large basilica. The city's inscriptions record an unusually long list of trade guilds, longer than for any other city of Roman Asia: wool-workers, linen-workers, dyers, tanners, leather-workers and bronze-smiths among them.
How it connects to the Bible
Lydia, the businesswoman Paul met at Philippi, was “a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira” (Acts 16:14), which fits the town's known dyeing and cloth trades. Revelation's letter to Thyatira (2:18–29) attacks a prophetess called Jezebel who taught believers to eat food sacrificed to idols. Many commentators link this to the pressure to join trade-guild banquets held in honour of the gods.