(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Where did Paul’s “fateful trip” finally end?  In a couple of my latest posts, we have been following Paul as he worked his way from Caesarea to Rome as a prisoner. When we last left him, he was on a ship that was intended for Phoenix on the southern coast of Crete, but instead the ship was blown off course and Paul and his companions were shipwrecked on the island of Malta.

Paul and his companions wintered on Malta (see here and here for pictures). Paul healed many people there and most likely spread the gospel in the area as best he could. When winter was over, Paul and his escort of Roman soldiers were finally able to board another ship and travel to Rome. Our “obscure site” this week is the place where they landed for the last time. After making brief stops at Syracuse and Rhegium, Paul finally ended his long sea journey at the harbor city of Puteoli:

After three months we set sail in a ship that had wintered in the island, a ship of Alexandria, with the twin gods as a figurehead. Putting in at Syracuse, we stayed there for three days. And from there we made a circuit and arrived at Rhegium. And after one day a south wind spring up, and on the second day we came to Puteoli. There we found brothers and were invited to stay with them for seven days. And so we came to Rome. (Acts 28:11-14, ESV.)

In the map above, Puteoli is located in the bottom right (click on the image to enlarge). Puteoli had a population of about 100,000 people at this time. Its importance was tied to the fact that the Italian Peninsula does not have very many good harbors. Puteoli was one of the few harbors that were deep enough and protected enough to be of much use to the Romans. And since, for many years, it was the closest good harbor to Rome, it was the main harbor of the capital city and commerce streamed in and out of this port. Much of the wealth of the Roman Empire flowed through this spot.

Of course, when we say it was close to Rome, “close” is a relative term. Puteoli actually sits about 150 miles away. From here, Paul had to travel north on the Via Consularis until he reached the city of Capua, and there stepped onto the Appian Way which finally took him to Rome. To continue Paul’s journey and to see a picture of the Appian Way from the PLBL, see my previous post here.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Continuing our series on “obscure sites” in the PLBL, today we come to a site so obscure that no biblical character ever visited this place, although it is mentioned in the book of Acts.

In an earlier post, we discussed the city of Myra where Paul briefly stopped as he was being transported to Rome. It was there that Paul and his escort of Roman soldiers boarded a grain ship that was traveling to Rome (Acts 27:5-6), but this ship was destined never to arrive. It made it as far as Fair Havens on the southern coast of Crete (Acts 27:8). By this time, the season was changing and winter was coming, but Fair Havens was not a good place to spend the winter because the wind blew right into the harbor. (See here for more information on that topic.) Although Paul warned them not to go any farther, the pilot, the boat owner, and the centurion decided to try to reach another city on the southern coast of Crete: the city of Phoenix (Acts. 27:9-12).

They never made it.

So Phoenix ends up on our list of obscure sites, instead of being trumpeted as the winter quarters of the Apostle Paul. Meanwhile, Paul and his companions were lost at sea and were eventually shipwrecked on a reef off the coast of Malta. On the map below, you can see Fair Havens (where they started) on the southern coast of Crete in the center of the picture, and you can see Phoenix (where they intended to land) to the west  of there (click on the image to enlarge). As you can see from the measurement scale, it was only a distance of about 80 kilometers (50 miles).

Here is the site of Phoenix as it appears today (click on the photo for a higher resolution):

There is one fascinating detail of the description of Phoenix in Acts 27. Luke tells us it is “a harbor of Crete, facing both southwest and northwest” (Acts 27:12). As you can see, the ancient city of Phoenix was built on a promontory, which in modern times is called Cape Mauros. The modern village of Loutro uses a beautiful harbor on the east side of Cape Mauros, located just over the hill in the left side of the picture above. However, in ancient times, the inhabitants of Phoenix used the harbor on the west, and there is still evidence today that the ancient western harbor had two inlets. The one that faces southwest still survives today. The one the faces northwest is harder to see because the waterline is much lower that it was in antiquity and because a rocky reef that extends west from the tip of the cape would have extended farther in the first century than it does now. This reef would have helped to form one side of the northwest inlet.

In the picture above (taken from the PowerPoint presentation included in Volume 13 of the PLBL) the site of Phoenix, the reef, and the southwest and northwest inlets of the harbor are marked. For more information on this topic, you can consult the annotations in that PowerPoint presentation, the information posted here on the BiblePlaces website, or an article by R. M. Ogilvie in the Journal of Theological Studies, vol. 9 (1958), pp. 308-314. The geographical details of Luke’s accounts in the book of Acts have long been praised as extremely accurate. This is just one example among many that Luke knew what he was talking about.

This photo and map are available in Volume 13 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands and is available here for $24 (with free shipping). Additional photos and information about Phoenix are available here on the BiblePlaces website, as well as photos and information about these other locations on the island of Crete: Fair Havens, Gortyn, and Knossos.  For other posts in our series on “obscure sites in the PLBL,” see here.