The Roman province of northern Greece, the homeland of Alexander the Great three centuries earlier, holding Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea — the first European soil Paul set foot on, summoned there by a night vision of 'a man of Macedonia' begging him to come over (Acts 16:9). Its congregations were poor and generous, and Paul repeatedly holds up 'the churches of Macedonia' as the model givers (2 Corinthians 8:1-5). It appears in 2 Corinthians 1 as a leg of the changed travel plan — Corinth to Macedonia and back — the itinerary his opponents used to accuse him of unreliability.