Corinth: the synagogue lintel and the meat market
Corinth has a synagogue inscription and an excavated meat market — the two institutions Paul's Corinthian correspondence assumes.
Confirmed by the groundInscription1st–3rd century AD
A broken stone lintel from the road to the harbour reads "[Syna]gogue of the Hebr[ews]". Nearby, the excavated market building carries a Latin inscription for the macellum — the meat market Paul mentions when writing to the city about food sold there.
Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question for conscience sake.
- Found
- Corinth, Greece, 1898 — American School of Classical Studies excavations
- Now held at
- Archaeological Museum of Ancient Corinth
- Language
- Greek and Latin
- How it reached us
- Dug up, or still standing where it was built.
What it shows
The lintel is probably later than Paul's stay; it shows a Jewish community with a synagogue on that road, not the building he taught in.
How historians use it
Standard finds in the archaeology of Roman Corinth.
In Scripture
Connects to
Sources
- Murphy-O'Connor, St. Paul's Corinth: Texts and Archaeology, 3rd ed.
These summaries are written in English for now. Translations follow.