GALATIA. — Region inhabited by the Galatians. From Galatia proper the name passed to the Roman province established after the death of Amyntas, the last of the Galatians (36–25 BC). Galatia proper was bounded on the north by Bithynia and Paphlagonia, on the east by Pontus and Cappadocia, on the south by Lycaonia, and on the west by Phrygia. As a Roman province it also included part of Phrygia, Lycaonia, Pisidia, and Isauria, with the exception of certain districts annexed to Cappadocia and Pamphylia.
Galatia owes its name (Γαλατία) to those Celtic tribes (κελταί κελατοί, Γαλατία) which, in the 3rd century BC, pushed into the heart of Asia Minor, causing considerable disturbance to the native peoples. The tribe of the Trocmii settled around Tavium, on the frontier of Cappadocia, the Tolistobogii at Pessinus in Phrygia, and the Tectosages at Ancyra. In 189 BC they were defeated by the consul Manlius Vasso, then again by Eumenes II in 183 BC and in 168 BC. For their loyalty to Rome during the Third Mithridatic War (74–64 BC), Pompey granted them a king in the person of Deiotarus (64–40 BC), tetrarch of the Tolistobogii, and under Amyntas they were able to extend their dominion over much of the southern territories later incorporated into the imperial province of Galatia.
The distinction between the territory occupied by the Galatians (τὸ κοινὸν τῶν Γαλατῶν) and the Roman province of Galatia is important for the debated question of the recipients of the Epistle to the Galatians (v.).
Profane writers sometimes use the name Galatia to denote the entire Roman province. More often, however, a distinction is drawn between the province and the territory occupied by the true Galatians. This is also reflected in the inscriptions so far discovered, with the exception of one found at Iconium (Corp. Inscr. Graec., 3991). The inscription from Antioch in Pisidia (CIL II, 291; Suppl., 638) mentions the “Legatus provinciae Galatiae, Pisidiae, Phrygiae, Lycaoniae, Isauriae, Paphlagoniae, Ponti Galatici, Ponti Polemoniani, Armeniae.” On a milestone discovered in 1861, an official document from the time of Diocletian, we read: “Caesennius Gallus, legatus pro praetore... vias provinciarum Galatiae, Cappadociae, Ponti, Pisidiae, Paphlagoniae, Lycaoniae, Armeniae minoris...” (cf. G. Perrot, p. 101 sq.). Other inscriptions are found in F. W. K. Dittenberger, Orientis Graeci inscriptiones selectae, II, Leipzig 1905, no. 533; E. Michon, in Revue biblique, 14 (1917), pp. 208–217.
From the text of the Acts of the Apostles one can scarcely doubt that by Galatia is meant the territory inhabited by the Galatians rather than the Roman province. In Acts 16:6 and 18:23 the Galatian country (Ἀλατικὴ χώρα) is listed alongside Phrygia, thus distinguished from it, though part of Phrygia was included in the Roman province of Galatia. In Acts 16:6, Paul and his companions, among whom was Timothy recently taken from Lystra (Acts 16:2 ff.), are in the southern part of the Roman province of Galatia; and to pass into Phrygia and Galatia means to speak in an ethnographic rather than an administrative sense. Elsewhere too the Acts follow this norm, speaking of Pamphylia (13:13), Pisidia (13:14), and Lycaonia (14:6).
For St. Paul the matter is less clear, and the destination of the Epistle to the Galatians remains a matter of debate.
Galatia is also mentioned in 1 Macc. 8:2 and 2 Tim. 4:10; but since the Greeks translated the Latin Gallia as Γαλατία, it is possible that in both texts reference is made to Gaul, and the peoples conquered by the Romans in 1 Macc. 8:2 could be the inhabitants of Cisalpine Gaul, subdued in 183 BC.