Apostles of the Seventy: Archippus and Philemon, and martyred Equal-to-the-Apostles Apphia

Philemon was a leading citizen of Colossae in Phrygia, and Apphia, as John Chrysostom held, was his wife. Their house served the Christians of Colossae as a church, and Paul's Letter to Philemon greets them both, together with Archippus, whom Paul calls his fellow soldier. Tradition holds that Archippus became bishop of Colossae and that Philemon too became a bishop and preached in the cities of Phrygia.

According to their Life, during a pagan festival of Artemis a crowd broke into Philemon's house while the Christians were at prayer. The three were brought before the governor, buried up to the waist and stoned. Philemon and Apphia died under the stones; Archippus, left half alive, was killed by boys with knives.