Hippo Regius
The ruins of the city Augustine served as bishop, with early Christian remains, immediately below the basilica that bears his name.
- Location
- Annaba, Algeria
- 36.8780° N · 7.7340° E
- Type
- Ancient Christian and Roman archaeological site
- Roman and late-antique city remains, with the Christian quarter, forum, baths and villas laid open, and a site museum above the excavations
- Dedication
- Not a church. An open archaeological site; the Basilica of Saint Augustine stands on the hill above it.
A diocese you can walk across
Augustine is read as a universal Doctor of the Church, and he is one. He was also a working bishop with a small African port to govern, a congregation to preach to week after week, disputes to settle, and Donatists and Pelagians to answer. Standing in the excavated city makes the second thing as real as the first, and the two together are the man.
The African Church at its height, and its end
By Augustine's time the Church of Roman Africa had been Latin Christianity's intellectual and episcopal heartland for two centuries. Tertullian wrote here; Cyprian was bishop and martyr at Carthage; councils met with seventy, then ninety, then several hundred bishops. Augustine's Hippo belonged to that Church, not to a European mission. He died in 430 as the Vandals besieged the city, and the world that produced him did not outlast the century by much. The site is quiet now, and the honest thing to feel here is not triumph but the weight of a great local Church that ended.
Hippo was a Phoenician trading post, a Numidian city allied to Carthage, and a Roman colony and grain port before it was Augustine's see.
The large early Christian basilica on the site is traditionally identified as the church in which Augustine preached. The identification is long-standing and widely accepted, but it is an archaeological identification rather than a documented one.
The Musee d'Hippone above the site holds finds from the city.
Hippone is one of the fourteen sites Algeria has placed on its UNESCO Tentative List as the Augustinian Itineraries.
These streets were a diocese. The man who wrote The City of God spent his life governing this one.
This is archaeology, and it is also the ground of a saint's ministry. There is no liturgy on the site. A pilgrim who wants to pray goes up to the basilica on the hill, where Mass is celebrated. What belongs to the ruins is attention, and perhaps a passage of the Confessions read where it was written.
- That the Christian remains are identified archaeologically, not documented by name
- How little separates the ruins from the living basilica, and how much separates the two Churches
- That Augustine's letters and sermons are themselves the record of his travels across Numidia
Do Not Miss
-
01
The Christian basilica and baptistery
Traditionally identified as the church where Augustine preached. Hold the identification as archaeology, not documentation.
-
02
The scale of the city
A real port with a forum, baths and cisterns. This was a diocese, not a monument.
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03
The museum
The mosaics and finds give the city back some of its ordinary life.
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04
The hill above
The basilica, the relic and the Mass are five minutes away. The ruins are the first half of the visit, not the whole of it.
See all 4 · 1 more
- The hill above The basilica, the relic and the Mass are five minutes away. The ruins are the first half of the visit, not the whole of it.
How to Visit
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No liturgy on the site itself
-
Mass at the Basilica of Saint Augustine, a few minutes away on the hill
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Private reading of the Confessions and the sermons among the ruins
Pair the ruins with the basilica above them.
The archaeological site and its museum sit directly below the Basilica of Saint Augustine. Opening arrangements for Algerian archaeological sites change and are not reliably published in advance; ask locally or through the basilica. Algeria requires a visa for most travellers.
- Type
- Open archaeological site with a museum
- Liturgy
- None on the site; Mass is at the basilica on the hill above
- Pair with
- Basilica of Saint Augustine, a few minutes away
- Before you go
- Confirm site opening locally; Algeria requires a visa for most travellers
Current access
Neither half means much alone. Seen as one visit, the excavated city and the church above it hold Augustine's forty years in one frame.
Prayer and custody
There is no liturgy among the stones and no devotion organised around them. What is asked of a visitor here is attention rather than piety.
Relics, Tombs, Sacred Objects
Tomb and Burial
- No burial is claimed here. Augustine died at Hippo in 430 and his body was later carried to Sardinia and then to Pavia.
Relics and Sacred Tradition
- No relic is kept on the archaeological site. The relic of Augustine's arm is held in the basilica on the hill above.
Sacred Objects
- The remains of the early Christian basilica traditionally called the Basilica Pacis
- A baptistery
- The forum, streets, baths, cisterns and mosaics of the Roman city
Connected Saints
Continue Your Pilgrimage
Map
Hero image sourced from Wikimedia Commons (Dzkouslavia, CC BY-SA 4.0); it shows the excavated city with the basilica on the hill beyond, which is the relationship this record describes. The Basilica Pacis is recorded here as an archaeological identification rather than a documented one. Coordinates from Algeria's UNESCO Tentative List submission.
Awaiting source.
September 17, 2026
Photo credits
- Hero. Dzkouslavia, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Source. CC BY-SA 4.0.