Man arrested for illegal excavation at Philippi archaeological site

A 53-year-old man has appeared before a prosecutor in the northern city of Kavala on suspicion of conducting an illegal excavation at the archaeological site of Philippi.

Police said the man, equipped with a metal detector, earphones, a small carving tool and an improvised digging tool, conducted the illegal dig on the site on Wednesday evening.

A subsequent search of his home yielded two lead objects and two ancient Roman coins, which an archaeologist deemed fell within the law on the protection of antiquities.

Philippi is the location of the oldest Neolithic settlement in Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, and one of the largest in the Balkans. Saint Paul founded the first Christian church on European soil at Philippi in AD 49-50.