Ptolemais

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PTOLEMAIS (Act_21:7).—The same as Acco (Jdg_1:31), now the port ‘Akka, called in the West, since Crusading times. Acre or St. Jean d’Acre. Acco received the name Ptolemais some time in the 3rd cent b.c., probably in honour of Ptolemy ii., but although the name was in common use for many centuries, it reverted to its Semitic name after the decline of Greek influence. Although so very casually mentioned in OT and NT, this place has had as varied and tragic a history as almost any spot in Palestine. On a coast peculiarly unfriendly to the mariner, the Bay of ‘Akka is one of the few spots where nature has lent its encouragement to the building of a harbour; its importance in history has always been as the port of Galilee and Damascus, of the Hauran and Gilead, while in the days of Western domination the Roman Ptolemais and the Crusading St. Jean d’Acre served as the landing-place of governors, of armies, and of pilgrims. So strong a fortress, guarding so fertile a plain, and a port on the highroad to such rich lands to north, east, and south, could never have been overlooked by hostile armies, and so we find the Egyptian Thothmes iii., Setl i., and Rameses ii., the Assyrian Sennacherib, Esarhaddon, and Ashurbanipal, and several of the Ptolemys engaged in its conquest or defence. It is much in evidence in the history of the Maccabees,—a queen Cleopatra of Egypt holds it for a time, and here some decades later Herod the Great entertains Cæsar. During the Jewish revolt it is an important base for the Romans, and both Vespasian and Titus visit it. In later times, such warriors as Baldwin i. and Guy de Lusignan, Richard Cœur de Lion and Saladin, Napoleon i. and Ibrahim Pasha are associated with its history.
In the OT it is mentioned only as one of the cities of Asher (Jdg_1:31), while in Act_21:7 it occurs as the port where St. Paul landed, ‘saluted the brethren, and abode with them one day,’ on his way to the new and powerful rival port, Cæsarea, which a few decades previously had sprung up to the south.
The modern ‘Akka (11,000 inhabitants) is a city, much reduced from its former days of greatness, situated on a rocky promontory of land at the N. extremity of the bay to which it gives its name. The sea lies on the W. and S., and somewhat to the E. The ancient harbour lay on the S, and was protected by a mole running E. from the S. extremity, and one running S. from the S.E. corner of the city. Ships of moderate dimensions can approach near the city, and the water is fairly deep. The walls, partially Crusading work, which still surround the city, are in the ruined state to which they were reduced in 1840 by the bombardment by the English fleet under Sir Sidney Smith. Extending from Carmel in the south to the ‘Ladder of Tyre’ in the north, and eastward to the foothills of Galilee, is the great and well-watered ‘Plain of Acre,’ a region which, though sandy and sterile close to the sea, is of rich fertility elsewhere. The two main streams of this plain are the Nahr Na‘mân (R. Belus), just south of ‘Akka, and the Kishon near Carmel.
Under modern conditions, Haifa, with its better anchorage for modern steamships, and its new railway to Damascus, is likely to form a successful rival to ‘Akka.
E. W. G. Masterman.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909

Originally ACCHO; the old name is resumed, Jean, d'Acre. Paul visited the Christians there on his return from his third missionary journey, between Tyre and Caesarea (Act_21:3; Act_21:7-8).
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.

Ptolema'is. See Accho.
Smith's Bible Dictionary
By Dr. William Smith.Published in 1863

See ACCHO.
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.

tol-ḗ-mā?is (Πτολεμαΐ́ς, Ptolemaı̄́s): Same as ?Acco? in Jdg_1:31. Ptolemais was the most prominent town on the Phoenician seacoast in Maccabean times (1 Macc 5:15, 55; 10:1, 58, 60; 12:48), and is once mentioned in the New Testament in Act_21:7 as a seaport at which Paul landed for one day, visiting the ?brethren? in the place. See ACCO; PHOENICIA.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.

Ptolema?is [ACCHO]




The Popular Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature
by John Kitto.

Ptolemais
(Πτολεμαϊvς), the name of two places in Scripture.
1. The same as Accho (q.v.). The name is, in fact, an interpolation in the history of the place. The city which was called Accho in the earliest Jewish annals, and which is again the Akka or St. Jean d'Acre of crusading and modern times, was named Ptolemais in the Macedonian and Roman periods. In the former of these periods it was the most important town upon the coast, and it is prominently mentioned in the first book of Maccabees (1Ma_5:15; 1Ma_5:55; 1Ma_10:1; 1Ma_10:58; 1Ma_10:60; 1Ma_12:48). In the latter its eminence was far outdone by Herod's new city of Caesarea. It is worthy of notice that Herod, on his return from Italy to Syria, landed at Ptolemais (Josephus, Ant. 14:15, 1). Still in the New Test. Ptolemais is a marked point in Paul's travels both by land and sea. He must have passed through it on all his journeys along the great coast road which connected Caesarea and Antioch (Act_11:30; Act_12:25; Act_15:2; Act_15:30; Act_18:22); and the distances are given both in the Antonine and Jerusalem itineraries (Wesseling, Itin. p. 158, 584). But it is specifically mentioned in Act_21:7 as containing a Christian community, visited for one dav by Paul. On this occasion he came to Ptolemais by sea. He was then on his return voyage from the third missionary journey. The last harbor at which he had touched was Tyre (Act_21:3). From Ptolemais he proceeded, apparently by land, to Caesarea (Act_21:8), and thence to Jerusalem (Act_21:17). SEE PAUL.
2. A place described as ροοοφορος, rose-producing (3Ma_7:17), and supposed to be the ὅρμος Πτολεμαϊvς of Ptolemy (4:5, 57), in Central Egypt, in the Arsinoite nome, a district still abounding in roses (Mannert, Geogr. der Griechen u. Romanen, 10:1, p. 419; Ritter, Erdkunde, i, 795, 797).

CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.

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