PAMPHYLIA păm fĭl’ ĭ ə (Παμφυλία, G4103). Situated halfway along the S coast of Asia Minor, this lowland district is only one of two locations on this seaboard where the mountains do not plunge steeply to the sea (eastern Cilicia is the other plain). At the time of the Apostle Paul, Pamphylia was a small Rom. province, extending seventy-five m. along the coast and thirty m. inland, following the lower course of the valley of the Cestrus to the Taurus mountains in the interior. It was surrounded by Cilicia to the E, Lycia to the SW and Pisidia to the N. The region was subject to numerous invasions of peoples, commencing with the Dorian conquest. It was subject successively to Lydia, Persia, Alexander the Great, the Seleucids, Pergamum, and Rome. Long the haunt of pirates, the Romans established about 102 b.c. in the province of “Cilicia,” a small series of posts on the Pamphylian coast to check piracy. In 36 b.c., Antony gave Pamphylia to Amyntas of Galatia. About a.d. 43, it was detached from Galatia, and the Lycian territory was added to it. Under Nero the Lycians were freed, and in a.d. 69, Pamphylia and Galatia were put under one governor. Further territorial changes were made, and again in a.d. 76, the Rom. province of Pamphylia was extended into the mountainous interior—into Pisidia.

This province is first mentioned in the NT in Acts 2:10, where it is said that some of the pilgrims in Jerusalem at Pentecost were from here. Later, Paul visited the territory on his first missionary journey when he preached at Perga, the chief center of the territory (Acts 13:13; 14:24). Here John Mark left the party and returned to Jerusalem (Acts 13:13; 15:38). Christianity appears to have been slow in becoming established here, in an area characterized by its amalgam of ethnic groups. The church founded at Perga is the only one mentioned in the 1st cent., but there were twelve or more founded at the time of the “Diocletian persecution” of a.d. 304. Besides Perga, the chief cities of Pamphylia were Attalia (c. twelve m. SW of the chief city), Side (over thirty m. to the SE) founded by Aeolian settlers, Aspendus—a Pers. naval base, and Attaleia, founded by Athenian colonists about 189 b.c. It was prob. at Attaleia where the Apostle Paul began his journey through the province.

Bibliography A. H. M. Jones, Cities of the Eastern Roman Provinces (1937), 124ff.