[Diego1618]

Vatican hill was well known in that day as the place where sorcerer's and seers were buried, and thus probably the place where Simon Magus and his followers were buried.

This could be true. We do know that Simon was called a god by the Romans themselves. We know he had a statue erected in his honor....inscribed as "Simoni deo Sancto" (the holy god, Simon). Justin Martyr writes of this in his Apology in the first century (152 A.D.) It is interesting to note that Justin says nothing about the Apostle Peter..... and the statue to Simon Magus is still standing at the time Justin wrote!

Simon Magus and his brand of Christianity was dangerous as it blended Greek and Babylonian paganism along with actual Christian beliefs and evidently suckered quite a few folks. This is the main reason Luke [Acts 8] devotes the time he does to identifying this brand of Christianity as it was quite apparent by the time the Book of Acts was written that Simon had many adherents.....mostly in Rome.

[Uncle Chip]

The very first mention of Peter in Rome anywhere in any writings comes from the apocryophal Acts of Peter apparently written by Leucius Charinus that was circulating atleast by 150 AD. It appeared after Justin Martur, thus explaining why he makes no mention of Peter in Rome. Several early church fathers like Tertullian and Hippolytus and even Irenaeus were no doubt taken in by some of the stuff in this fraudulent document. Thus the myth of Peter in Rome began to grow.

I'm surprised that there hasn't been a move somewhere in the Vatican for the sainthood of this Leucius Charinus, as he was probably the one who got it all started.