Priscilla. — The correct reading here is Prisca, of which form Priscilla is the diminutive. It is rather remarkable that the wife should be mentioned first. Perhaps it may be inferred that she was the more active and conspicuous of the two.
Aquila was a Jew of Pontus, whom St. Paul had found with his wife at Corinth (Acts 18:1). They had there been converted by him, and afterwards appear in his company at Ephesus (Acts 18:18; Acts 18:26; 1 Corinthians 16:19). At the time when this Epistle was written they were at Rome, but later they seem to have returned to Ephesus (2 Timothy 4:19).
The Jew Aquila, who rather more than a century later made a translation of the Old Testament, critically compared with the LXX. in the Hexapla of Origen, also came from Pontus.