Located at the crossroads between the Middle East and Western Europe, Partikopolis (later Sveti Vrach, in honour of the holy inmercenaries Cosmas ans Damian, martyrs in Rome in 284) and the Middle Struma region lie about a hundred kilometers from the Aegean coast. They became the site of the special attention of Christ’s teaching and Christ’s church as soon as they appeared. In the mid 1st century, Apostle Paul was the first to preach the Christian doctrine there. Paul, together with his fellow faster Silas (also known as St. Sivanus), founded Christian communities in Philippi, Amphipolis, Apollonia, Thessaloniki, Beroia and other towns along the coastal road of the Roman province of Macedonia to Constantinople. From the Christian communities along the Via Ignatia, Christianity spread to the interior of the peninsula in the years to follow – along the course of the two large rivers Struma and Mesta, to Partikopolis, Pautalia, Serdica, Nicopolis ad Nestum, etc. The main work of Paul the Apostle was the spread of Christianity in the interior of the province of Macedonia, in the northeastern part of which Partikopolis was located.