Philippi in Fausset's Bible Dictionary

A city of Macedon, in a plain between the Pangaeus arid Haemus ranges, nine miles from the sea. Paul from the port Neapolis (Kavalla) on the coast (Acts 16:11) reached Philippi by an ancient paved road over the steep range Symbolum (which runs from the W. end of Haemus to the S. end of Pangaeus) in his second missionary journey, A.D 51. The walls are traced along the stream; at 350 ft. from it is the site of the gate through which Paul went to the place of prayer by the river's (Gangites) side, where the dyer Lydia was converted, the firstfruits of the gospel in Europe. (See LYDIA.) Dyed goods were imported from Thyatira to the parent city Philippi, and were dispersed by pack animals among the mountaineers of Haemus and Pangaeus. The Satriae tribe had the oracle of Dionysus, the Thracian prophet god. The "damsel with the spirit of divination" may have belonged to this shrine, or else to Apollo's (as the spirit is called "Pythoness," Greek), and been hired by the Philippians to divine for hire to the country folk coming to the market. She met Paul several days on his way to the place of prayer, and used to cry out on each occasion "these servants of the most high God announce to us the way of salvation." Paul cast out the spirit; and her owners brought him and Silas before the magistrates, the duumvirs, who inflicted summary chastisement, never imagining they were Romans. Paul keenly felt this wrong (Acts 16:37), and took care subsequently that his Roman privilege should not be set at nought (Acts 22:25; 1 Thessalonians 2:2). Philippi was founded by Philip of Macedon, in the vicinity of the famed gold mines, on the site "the springs" (Kremides). Augustus founded the Roman "colony" to commemorate his victory over Brutus and Cassius Acts 16:12), Acts 16:42 B.C., close to the ancient site, on the main road from Europe to Asia by Brundusium, Dyrrachium, across Epirus to Thessalonica, and so forward by Philippi. Philippi was "the first (i.e. farthest from Rome and first which Paul met in entering Macedon) city of the district" called Macedonia Prima, as lying farthest eastward, not as KJV "the chief city." Thessalonica was chief city of the province, and Amphipolis of the district "Macedonia Prima." A "colony" (accurately so named by Luke as distinguished from the Greek apoikia) was Rome reproduced in miniature in the provinces (Jul. Gellius, 16:13); its inhabitants had Roman citizenship, the right of voting in the Roman tribes, their own senate and magistrates, the Roman law and language. That the Roman "colonia," not the Greek apoikia...