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The spread of Christianity

From a small movement in Roman Judea to a global faith, traced from AD 30 to the present.

All eras
AD 30 – present

Centres of the faith, era by era

Select any place to fly to it on the map.

Apostolic age AD 30–100

From Jerusalem the gospel spreads along Roman roads and sea lanes to the major cities of the eastern Mediterranean.

  • Jerusalem AD 30The church is born at Pentecost (Acts 2).
  • Antioch AD 40Believers are first called ‘Christians’ here; base for Paul’s missions.
  • Damascus AD 37Saul’s conversion; an early Christian community.
  • Ephesus AD 53Paul’s long ministry; later home to the apostle John.
  • Corinth AD 51A major Pauline congregation in Greece, founded on Paul’s second journey.
  • Rome AD 50A church exists before Paul writes to it; Peter and Paul are martyred here.
  • Alexandria AD 60Tradition links its founding to Mark; later a great centre of Christian learning.
  • Edessa AD 90An early hub of Syriac-speaking Christianity.

Ante-Nicene AD 100–325

Despite persecution, the church takes root across the empire, in North Africa, Asia Minor, and Gaul, and beyond the eastern frontier.

  • Carthage AD 180Centre of Latin North African Christianity; Tertullian, Cyprian.
  • Lyon AD 150Irenaeus; site of an early persecution (177).
  • Smyrna AD 110Polycarp, disciple of John, martyred here.
  • Seleucia-Ctesiphon AD 200Seat of the Catholicos of the Church of the East under Parthian, then Sasanian, rule.
  • Dura-Europos AD 230The earliest known Christian house-church building.
  • Vagharshapat (Armenia) AD 301Traditionally dated 301 (many historians prefer c. 314): Gregory the Illuminator baptises King Tiridates III, and Armenia becomes the first kingdom to adopt Christianity officially.

Christian empire AD 325–600

After Constantine, Christianity becomes the empire’s dominant faith and spreads into Ethiopia, Nubia, Ireland, and Persia.

  • Constantinople AD 330Constantine’s new Christian capital; future seat of Eastern Orthodoxy.
  • Mtskheta (Georgia) AD 337Through the preaching of Nino, King Mirian III of Iberia adopts Christianity (c. 330s).
  • Aksum (Ethiopia) AD 340Frumentius evangelises the Aksumite kingdom.
  • Lisbon AD 356Potamius, the first known bishop of Lisbon, takes part in the Arian controversy of the 350s.
  • Dongola (Nubia) AD 543The Nubian kingdoms along the Nile (Nobatia, Makuria, and Alodia) become Christian.
  • Hippo Regius AD 395Augustine serves as bishop; a high point of Latin theology.
  • Armagh (Ireland) AD 444Patrick’s mission establishes the Irish church; 444 is the traditional date of his founding of Armagh.
  • Nisibis AD 350Home of Ephrem the Syrian until 363; its school, founded in 489, becomes the leading theological school of the Church of the East.
  • Kodungallur (Kerala) AD 550Cosmas Indicopleustes records Christians in India in the sixth century; tradition holds that the apostle Thomas landed here in AD 52.

Early medieval AD 600–1000

Missionaries convert the peoples of northern and eastern Europe while the Church of the East reaches Central Asia and China.

  • Canterbury AD 597Augustine of Canterbury’s mission to the Anglo-Saxons.
  • London AD 604Mellitus, sent from Rome to join Augustine’s mission, becomes the first bishop of London.
  • Xi’an (Chang’an) AD 635The Church of the East reaches Tang China (Xi’an Stele, 781).
  • Utrecht AD 690Willibrord evangelises the Frisians.
  • Fulda AD 744Boniface, ‘apostle to the Germans’; monastic mission base.
  • Kyiv (Kiev) AD 988Vladimir’s baptism of Rus’ brings Orthodoxy to the East Slavs of Rus’.
  • Great Moravia AD 863Cyril and Methodius create a Slavonic liturgy and alphabet.
  • Prague (Bohemia) AD 883Duke Bořivoj is baptised, traditionally by Methodius (c. 883); Prague becomes a bishopric in 973.

High & late medieval AD 1000–1500

Christianity is consolidated across Europe and Rus’, even as Islam advances and the eastern churches contract. In the 1490s Portuguese and Spanish voyages carry it to Kongo and the Caribbean.

  • Nidaros (Trondheim) AD 1030Christianity established across Scandinavia.
  • Gniezno (Poland) AD 1000Mieszko I is baptised in 966; in 1000 Gniezno becomes the metropolitan see of the Polish church.
  • Toledo AD 1085Alfonso VI of Castile takes Toledo, restoring Christian rule over a city where Mozarabic Christians had kept their church.
  • Riga AD 1201Bishop Albert founds Riga; Christianity is imposed on the peoples of Livonia by crusading orders.
  • Mbanza-Kongo (Kongo) AD 1491King Nzinga a Nkuwu is baptised, and the Kingdom of Kongo adopts Christianity.
  • Santo Domingo AD 1496The first permanent European Christian city in the Americas.

Age of exploration AD 1500–1800

European expansion and Catholic missions carry Christianity to the Americas, sub-Saharan Africa, India, and East Asia.

  • Mexico City AD 1524Franciscan missions begin a vast evangelisation of New Spain.
  • Goa (India) AD 1542Francis Xavier arrives and launches Jesuit missions in Asia.
  • Kagoshima (Japan) AD 1549Francis Xavier brings Christianity to Japan.
  • São Paulo AD 1554Jesuits found São Paulo as a mission settlement.
  • Manila AD 1571Spanish Augustinians, sailing from New Spain, make Manila the base of Catholic mission in the Philippines.
  • Luanda (Angola) AD 1575Portuguese Catholic missions extend down the Angolan coast.
  • Amsterdam AD 1578The city turns Protestant in the Alteration of 1578 and becomes a base of the Dutch East India Company, whose ships carry Reformed ministers to Asia and the Cape.
  • Mombasa (Swahili coast) AD 1593The Portuguese build a Christian foothold on the East African coast (Fort Jesus).
  • Cape Town AD 1652Dutch Reformed Christianity arrives at the Cape of Good Hope.
  • Beijing AD 1601Matteo Ricci establishes a Jesuit mission at the Ming court.
  • Quebec AD 1615French Catholic missions in North America.
  • New England (Boston) AD 1630Puritan settlers plant English Protestantism in North America.
  • Halifax (Nova Scotia) AD 1783Black Loyalists, many of them Baptist and Methodist believers, resettle in Nova Scotia after the American Revolution.
  • Freetown (Sierra Leone) AD 1792Black Loyalist settlers from Nova Scotia found Freetown, which becomes a base for West African missions.
  • Kodiak (Alaska) AD 1794Monks from Valaam, among them Herman of Alaska, begin the Russian Orthodox mission in Alaska.

Modern missions AD 1800–present

Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox missionary movements make Christianity a global, and increasingly non-Western, faith.

  • Serampore (India) AD 1800William Carey of the Baptist Missionary Society, in India from 1793, settles at Serampore; his work helps launch the modern Protestant missionary movement.
  • Cape Coast / Kumasi AD 1835Basel Mission (from 1828) and Wesleyan Methodist (from 1835) missionaries work in the Gold Coast, and the church spreads inland towards Kumasi.
  • Antananarivo (Madagascar) AD 1818The London Missionary Society begins the rapid Christianisation of Madagascar.
  • Honolulu AD 1820American Board missionaries from New England reach the Hawaiian Islands.
  • Buganda (Uganda) AD 1877Church Missionary Society missionaries arrive, followed by Catholic White Fathers in 1879; Christianity grows rapidly in East Africa.
  • Seoul AD 1884American Protestant missionaries arrive; Pyongyang becomes a centre after the 1907 revival.
  • Badagry / Lagos AD 1842Methodist missionary Thomas Birch Freeman lands at Badagry, followed by the CMS; Lagos becomes a centre of Nigerian Christianity, today among the world’s largest.
  • Onitsha (Nigeria) AD 1857Samuel Ajayi Crowther leads the Niger Mission, a pioneering African-led mission.
  • Blantyre (Malawi) AD 1876Scottish missions follow David Livingstone into Central Africa.
  • Kinshasa (Congo) AD 1880Catholic and Protestant missions spread through the Congo basin.

Approximate dates of significant Christian presence, drawn from standard church-history references, including Dale T. Irvin and Scott W. Sunquist, History of the World Christian Movement; Philip Jenkins, The Lost History of Christianity; and The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Coordinates are representative city or region centroids.