Ampliatus

The Holy Apostle Ampliatus is one of the seventy apostles, mentioned by the Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Romans, where he says: Greet Ampliatus, my beloved in the Lord (16:8). He was a Christian of Rome.

According to tradition, Ampliatus was a disciple of the Apostle Andrew, who made him bishop of Diospolis (Lydda), in Palestine. For his labour of preaching the Gospel he received a martyr's death at the hands of the Jews. Another tradition, kept in Bulgaria, says that with Urban and Narcissus he passed into the Balkan Peninsula, was bishop at Odessos (Varna) and died a martyr.

He is commemorated in the Orthodox Church on 4 January, in the Synaxis of the Seventy Apostles, and on 31 October, together with the apostles Stachys, Urban, Narcissus, Apelles and Aristobulus, who are named together in the troparion and kontakion of the day. The Roman calendar also commemorates him on 31 October.