Peter's Martyrdom

The event

Long before it happened, Jesus told Peter how his life would end: "when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go" - words John's Gospel explicitly says were spoken "to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God" (John 21:18-19). Peter's first letter, written from "Babylon" (widely understood as a coded reference to Rome), shows him ministering there among believers scattered across Asia Minor in the years before his death (1 Peter 5:13).

Church tradition, attested by early writers including Clement of Rome, Tertullian, and Eusebius, holds that Peter was crucified in Rome, and a strong and very early strand of that tradition adds a detail that has struck Christians for centuries: Peter asked to be crucified upside down, considering himself unworthy to die in the same manner as his Lord. Like Paul, Peter's death is consistently associated with the persecution under Nero following the great fire of Rome.

The traditional site of Peter's crucifixion and burial lies on Rome's Vatican Hill, where the original St. Peter's Basilica was later built directly over what early Christians already regarded as his tomb. As with Paul, the exact year of Peter's death cannot be fixed with precision, but the church has always received the tradition of his martyrdom in Rome as reliable, fulfilling, movingly, the very words Jesus spoke to him.

Dating

As with Paul, the exact year cannot be fixed with precision, but early and widespread tradition places Peter's death in Rome during or shortly after the Neronian persecution.

Scripture references

• John 21:18-19
• 1 Peter 5:13

Other witnesses

• Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25
• Tertullian, Scorpiace 15

Further reading

• Christian History Magazine 156: What Happened to the Apostles? — free full issue