CAESAREA PHILIPPI. - A city at the southern foot of Mount Hermon, where in the time of Joshua Ba'al Gādh stood. In antiquity the city and the region were called Paneas (a name that survives in today's Banyās), in honor of the god Pan, to whom the grotto was dedicated from which the eastern spring of the Jordan gushed forth. In honor of Augustus, Herod the Great built a temple there, and his son Herod Philip, tetrarch of Iturea and Trachonitis, enlarged and embellished the city, calling it C. To distinguish it from the homonymous maritime city of Palestine, it was called C. Paneas, or C. of P.: under this name it is remembered in the Gospels. Herod Agrippa II gave it the name Neronias, which was soon forgotten.
In the vicinity of this city Peter made his profession of faith, answered by the promise of the primacy: "Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church"
(Mt. 16:13-20). It does not appear that Jesus entered this pagan city. An ancient Christian legend reported by Eusebius (Historia ecl., VII, 18) places near C. the healing of the woman with the issue of blood (Mt. 9:20 and parallels), to whom, later, the name Veronica was attributed.
Traces remain of ancient Paneas and of the temple built by Herod. In the grotto there are inscriptions and votive niches. From the 4th century it was the seat of a diocese suffragan to Tyre, briefly revived with the Latin rite during the Crusades. It was definitively reconquered by Nûr ed-dîn in 1165. At present it is a Latin titular diocese. In 1886 a Melkite bishopric was erected there with 30 churches and parishes, 2,710 Catholics out of 50,000 inhabitants.