Nicopolis

VIEW:17 DATA:01-04-2020
the city of victory
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary


("city of victory".) In Epirus, founded by Augustus to celebrate his victory at Actium. On a peninsula W. of the bay of Actium. Tit_3:12 was written from Corinth in the autumn, Paul then purposing a journey through Aetolia and Acarnania into "Epirus," there "to winter"; a good center for missionary tours N. to Illyricum (Rom_15:19) and Dalmatia (2Ti_4:10).
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.


Nicop'olis. (city of victory). Nicopolis is mentioned in Tit_3:12, as the place where St. Paul was intending to pass the coming winter. Nothing is to be found in the Epistle itself to determine which Nicopolis is here intended. One Nicopolis was in Thrace, near the borders of Macedonia.
The subscription, (which, however, is of no authority), fixes on this place, calling it the Macedonian Nicopolis. But there is little doubt that Jerome's view is correct, and that the Pauline Nicopolis was the celebrated city of Epirus. This city, (the "city of victory"), was built by Augustus, in memory the battle of Actium. It was on a peninsula, to the west of the bay of Actium.
Smith's Bible Dictionary
By Dr. William Smith.Published in 1863


a city of Epirus, on the gulf of Ambracia, whither, as some think, St. Paul wrote to Titus, then in Crete, to come to him, Tit_3:12; but others, with greater probability, are of opinion, that the city of Nicopolis, where St. Paul was, was not that of Epirus, but that of Thrace, on the borders of Macedonia, near the river Nessus. Emmaus in Palestine was also called Nicopolis by the Romans.
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.


ni-kop?ṓ-lis (Νικόπολις, Nikópolis): A city in Palestine, half-way between Jaffa and Jerusalem, now called Ammās, mentioned in 1 Macc 3:40, 57 and 9:50. The earlier city (Emmaus) was burnt by Quintilius Varus, but was rebuilt in 223 AD as Nicopolis.
The Nicopolis, however, to which Paul urges Titus to come (πρός με εἰς Νικόπολιν, ἐκεῖ γὰρ κέκρικα παραχειμάσαι, prós me eis Nikópolin, ekeı́ gár kékrika paracheimásai (Tit_3:12)) is probably the city of that name situated on the southwest promontory of Epirus. If this view is correct, the statement made by some writers that from Eastern Greece (Athens, Thessalonica, Philippi, Corinth) Paul's labors extended to Italy, that he never visited Western Greece, requires modification. It is true that we do not hear of his preaching at Patras, Zacynthus, Cephallenia, Corcyra (the modern Corfu), which, as a way-station to and from Sicily, always held preeminence among the Ionian islands; but there can be little doubt that, if his plan of going to Nicopolis was carried out, he desired to evangelize the province of Epirus (as well Acarnania) in Western Greece. Indeed, it was in this very city of Nicopolis, probably, that he was arrested and taken to Rome for trial - during one of the winters between 64-67 AD.
Nicopolis was situated only a few miles North of the modern Prevesa, the chief city of Epirus today, the city which the Greeks bombarded in 1912 in the hope of wresting it from the Turks. The ancient city was founded by Augustus, whose camp happened to be pitched there the night before the famous fight with Antony (31 BC). The gulf, called Ambracia in ancient times, is now known as Arta. On the south side was Actium, where the battle was fought. Directly across, only half mile distant, on the northern promontory, was the encampment of Augustus. To commemorate the victory over his antagonist, the Roman emperor built a city on the exact spot where his army had encamped (?Victory City?). On the hill now called Michalitzi, on the site of his own tent, he built a temple to Neptune and instituted games in honor of Apollo, who was supposed to have helped him in the sea-fight. Nicopolis soon became the metropolis of Epirus, with an autonomous constitution, according to Greek custom. But in the time of the emperor Julian (362) the city had fallen into decay, at least in part. It was plundered by the Goths, restored by Justinian, and finally disappeared entirely in the Middle Ages, so far as the records of history show. One document has Νικόπολις ἡ νῦν Πρέβαζα, Nikopólis hē nún Prébeza, ?Nicopolis, which is now Prebeza.? In the time of Augustus, however, Nicopolis was a flourishing town. The emperor concentrated here the population of Aetolia and Acarnania, and made the city a leading member of the Amphictyonic Council. There are considerable ruins of the ancient city, including two theaters, a stadium, an aqueduct, etc.

Literature.
Kuhn, Ueber die Entstehung der staate der Alten.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.


Nicop?olis, a city of Thrace, now Nicopi on the river Nessus, now Karasou, which was here the boundary between Thrace and Macedonia; and hence the city is sometimes reckoned as belonging to the latter. In Tit_3:12, Paul expresses an intention to winter at Nicopolis, an invites Titus, then in Crete, to join him there.




The Popular Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature
by John Kitto.


Nicopolis
(Νικόπολις, city of victory), a city mentioned in Tit_3:12 as the place where, at the time of writing that epistle, Paul was intending to pass the coming winter, and where he wished Titus to meet him. Titus was at this time in Crete (Tit_1:5). The subscription to the epistle assumes that the apostle was at.Nicopolis when he wrote; but we cannot conclude this from the form of expression. We should rather infer that he was elsewhere, possibly at Ephesus or Corinth. He urges that no time should be lost (σπούδασον ἐλθεῖν); hence we conclude that winter was near.
Nothing is to be found in the epistle itself to determine which Nicopolis is here intended. There were cities of this name in Asia, Africa, and Europe, and many of them have been advocated in this connection. The question, however, is in reality confined to three of these places at most. One Nicopolis was in Thrace, near the borders of Macedonia. The subscription (which, however, is of no authority) fixes on this place, calling it the Macedonian Nicopolis: and such is the view of Chrysostom and Theodoret. De Wette's objection to this opinion (Pastoral Briefe, p. 21), that the place did not exist till Trajan's reign, appears to be a mistake. Another Nicopolis was in Cilicia; and Schrader (Der Apostel Paulus, 1:115-119) pronounces for this; but this opinion is connected with a peculiar theory regarding the apostle's journeys. We have little doubt that Jerome's view is correct, and that the Pauline Nicopolis was the celebrated city of Epirus (“ scribit Apostolus de Nicopoli, quee in Actiaco littore sita,” Jerome, Procmm. 9:195). For arrangements of Paul's journeys, which will harmonize with this, and with the other facts of the Pastoral Epistles, see Birks, Hores Apostolicae, p. 296-304; and Conybeare and Howson, Life and Epistles of St. Paul (2d ed.), 2:564-573. It is very possible, as is observed there, that Paul was arrested at Nicopolis, and taken thence to Rome for his final trial. It is a curious and interesting circumstance, when we look at the matter from a Biblical point of view, that many of the handsomest parts of the town were built by Herod the Great (Josephus, Ant. 16:5,3). It is likely enough that many Jews lived there. Moreover, it was conveniently situated for apostolic journeys in the eastern parts of Achaia and Macedonia, and also to the northward, where churches perhaps were founded. St. Paul had long before preached the Gospel at least on the confines of Illyricum (Rom_15:19), and ‘soon after the very period under consideration Titus himself was sent on a mission to Dalmatia (2Ti_4:10).
This city was founded by Augustus in commemoration of the battle of Actium, and stood upon the place where his land-forces encamped before that battle. From the mainland of Epirus, on the north, a promontory projects some five miles in the line of the shore, and is there separated by a channel half a mile wide from the opposite coast. This channel forms the entrance of the Gulf of Ambracius, which lies within the promontory. The naval battle was fought at the mouth of the gulf, and Actium, from which it took its name, and where Antony's camp was stationed, stood on the point forming the south side of the channel. The promontory is connected with the mainland by a narrow isthmus. Upon it Augustus encamped, his tent standing upon a height, from which he could command both the gulf and the sea. After the victory he enclosed the place where his tent was pitched, dedicated it to Neptune, and founded on the isthmus the city of Nicopolis (Dion Cas. li; Strabo, vii, p. 324), and made it a Roman colony. It was not more than some thirty years old when visited by the apostle, and yet it was then the chief city of Western Greece. The prosperity of Nicopolis was of short duration. It had fallen to ruin, but was restored by the emperor Julian. After being destroyed by the Goths, it was again restored by Justinian, and continued for a time the capital of Epirus (Mamertin. Julian, 9; Procopius, Bet. Goth. 4:22). During the Middle Ages the new town of Prevesa was built at the point of the promontory, and Nicopolis was deserted. The remains of the city still visible show its former extent and importance. They cover a large portion of the isthmus. Wordsworth thus describes the site: “A lofty wall spans a desolate plain; to the north of it rises, on a distant hill, the shattered scena of a theater; and to the west the extended, though broken, line of an aqueduct connects the distant mountains with the main subject of the picture — the city itself” (Greece, p. 229 sq.). There are also the ruins of a mediaeval castle, a quadrangular structure of brick, and a small theater, on the low marshy plain on which the city chiefly stood, and which is now dreary and desolate (Journal of R. G. S. 3:92 sq.; Leake, Northern Greece, 1:185 sq.; Cellarius, Geogr. 1:1080). The name given to the ruins is Paleoprevesa, or “Old Prevesa.” See Bowen, Athos and Epirus, p. 211; Merivale, Rome, 3:327, 328; Smith, Diet. of Greek and Roman Geogr. s.v.; Lewin, Life and Epistles of St, Paul (4to ed.), 2:353 sq.; Krenkel, Paulus der Apostel (Leipsic, 1869), p. 108.

CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.





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