Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander the Great's successors, established Antioch to anchor his new Seleucid Empire. Positioned on the Orontes River near the Mediterranean, the city grew into a hub of trade, learning, and early Christianity, rivaling Alexandria for the title of the ancient world's greatest city.
Legend holds that Seleucus chose the site after watching an eagle, a bird sacred to Zeus, snatch a piece of sacrificial meat and drop it precisely where he planned his new capital. He named it for his father, Antiochus, and within two centuries it had grown into a sprawling, cosmopolitan city of colonnaded streets, theaters, and a famous library.
Antioch's population may have reached half a million at its height under Roman rule, making it the third-largest city in the empire after Rome and Alexandria. It was here, according to the Book of Acts, that the followers of Jesus were first called 'Christians,' and the city became one of the five original patriarchates of the early Church.
Repeated earthquakes, Persian sackings, and the rise of Constantinople eventually eclipsed Antioch's glory, but for centuries it stood as a glittering proof of how quickly a conqueror's ambition could conjure a world city out of riverside scrubland.