Was St. Peter in Rome?

Many modern claims that Peter never went to Rome rely on the idea that the “Babylon” mentioned in 1 Peter 5:13 was literal Babylon, but this contradicts every early Christian source and the historical reality that ancient Babylon was already deserted at the time. Early Jews and Christians routinely used “Babylon” as a symbolic name for Rome, especially during the persecution under Nero, and every ancient commentator such as Papias, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Jerome, and others interpreted it this way. A powerful piece of evidence comes from St. Ignatius of Antioch around AD 107, who wrote to the Roman church, “I do not, as Peter and Paul, issue commandments unto you,” implying that both apostles had been physically present in Rome and exercised real apostolic authority over that community. Paul’s letter to the Romans does not count as this kind of “commanding,” since early Christians associated “commandments” with an apostle’s in person ministry, not merely written correspondence. All early Christian writers Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Dionysius of Corinth, Irenaeus, Gaius of Rome, Tertullian, and Eusebius affirm that Peter ministered in Rome and was martyred there, and no ancient writer ever claimed Peter died in Jerusalem. Together, these early witnesses form a consistent and unanimous historical picture: Peter was in Rome, he exercised leadership there, and he died there, exactly as the earliest Christians taught.