Hung upside down by his ankles until dead, the St. Philip said to be martyred in Hierapolis ("Holy City") in what is now Turkey may be Jesus' own apostle, listed among the Twelve in all four gospels. Or it may be the deacon named Philip who baptized the Ethiopian eunich in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 8:26-40).
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| St. Mariamne |
Philip's ministry in Asia Minor (Turkey) and Greece is told in the ancient, nonbiblical text known as the
Acts of Philip. The story, expanded and embellished over the centuries, tells of a Roman (pagan) proconsul who became enraged at the apostle and his missionary companions, Bartholomew and Mariamne, when the proconsul's wife, Nicanora, was converted to Christianity and then healed of a terrible illness.The three missionaries were tortured publicly, but only Philip was killed at that time, according to the tale.
Excavators of the church associated with St. Philip's martyrdom have searched fruitlessly there for Philip's burial site. Last month, a team led by Italian professor Francesco D'Andria discovered what may be St. Philip's grave in a smaller church recently discovered on the site.
“St. Philip is considered a martyr," D'Andria reminds us. "In fact, the church built in his name on the Martyrs’ Hill is, for this reason, also called Martyrion, despite the fact there were no traces of the grave of St. Philip. As we were cleaning out the new church we discovered a month ago, we finally found the grave. With close examination, we determined that the grave had been moved from its previous location in the St. Philip Church to this new church in the fifth century, during the Byzantine era."
When the archeological team opens and examines the newly discovered burial site they will, without doubt, painstakingly review the evidence to determine whether this is indeed the long-sought grave of St. Philip.
To learn more about this excavation, click
here.
To read an English translation of the Acts of Philip, click
here.
