Philippi
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How it came to be
In 360 or 359 BC colonists from Thasos founded a settlement called Krenides, meaning fountains, at the foot of Mount Orbelos. In 356 BC Philip II of Macedon took it and renamed it Philippi; he fortified it, partly drained the marsh and set up a mint after gold was found nearby. The town stood on the Via Egnatia, the road linking Europe and Asia.
In October 42 BC Antony and Octavian defeated the armies of Brutus and Cassius on the plain west of the city. Veterans were settled there afterwards and the city became a Roman colony, renamed Colonia Augusta Iulia Philippensis after Octavian took the title Augustus in 27 BC. Around AD 49 to 50 the apostle Paul visited, and Lydia, a merchant in purple cloth, was baptised.
A small church dedicated to Paul stood by about 343, and in the late 5th century it was replaced by a cathedral built around an octagonal church. An earthquake in the early 7th century almost destroyed the city, which never recovered, and it was abandoned after the Ottoman conquest in the 14th century. French and Greek excavations uncovered the theatre, forum, basilicas and bishop's quarter, and the site was inscribed in 2016.
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