Peter's name and presence are mentioned on occasions where apparently there is no reason for it; Mark herein wished to bring the apostle forward as his authority (see Mar 1:36; Mar 5:37; Mar 11:20-26; Mar 13:3). There are indications of the author having been a Galilean, which Peter was. Thus, Herod the tetrarch is styled "king"; the "lake' (as Luk 8:22 calls it, for he knew larger sects) is called "the sea of Galilee" (Mar 5:1). Only in Mar 6:30 the term of dignity, "apostle," is found; in Luke, as writing later, it frequently occurs. Things to their discredit are ingenuously stated by Matthew and Mark (Peter), as we might expect from apostles writing about themselves; but are sparingly introduced by Luke (Mat 16:9; Mar 7:18; Mar 10:41; Mar 14:31; Mar 6:52; Mar 9:10; Mar 10:32, the last three not in Matthew).

The account of many things is marked by vivid touches suitable to an eye-witness only, which Peter was; e.g. Mar 6:39, "the green grass" in the feeding of the 5,000; "the pillow of the ship" (Mar 4:38); Mar 10:50, "casting away his garment"; Mar 11:4, "the colt tied by the door without in a place where two ways met." The details of the demon-possessed Gadarene: "no man could bind him, no not with chains, because he had often been bound, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces; neither could any man tame him. And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, crying, and cutting himself with stones," etc. (Mar 5:2-5); and also the wild cry of another reproduced, "Ea" ("Ha!" not as KJV, "let us alone"), Mar 1:24.

Jesus' looks, Mar 3:5, "He looked round about on them in anger" (Mar 3:34); Mar 8:33; Mar 10:21-23, "Jesus beholding loved him," etc.; Mar 8:12, He sighed deeply in spirit ... why doth this generation seek after a sign?" Mar 1:41, "Jesus moved with compassion put forth His hand" touching the leper. All these minute touches, peculiar to him, show his Gospel is no epitome of the others but an independent witness, Mark tells Peter's humble origin (Mar 1:16-20), his connection with Capernaum (Mar 1:29), that Levi was son of Alphaeus (Mar 2:14), that Boanerges was the title given by Christ to James and John (Mar 3:17), that, the ruler of the synagogue was named Jairus (Mar 5:22), that Jesus was a "carpenter" (Mar 6:3), that the Canaanite woman was a Syrophoenician (Mar 7:26). Mark gives Dalmanutha for Magdala (Mar 8:10; Mat 15:39).

He names Bartimaeus (Mar 10:46), states that "Jesus would not suffer any to carry any vessel through the temple" (Mar 11:16), that Simon of Cyrene was father of Alexander and Rufus (Mar 15:21). Peter would be the probable source of these particulars of Mark's information. Jesus' rebuke of Peter is recorded, but His preeminent praise of him is omitted (Mar 8:32-33; compare Mat 16:18; Mat 16:23). The account of the thrice denial is full, but "bitterly" is omitted from his repentance (Mar 14:72). This is just what we might expect from an apostle writing about himself. The Roman character preponderates, abounding in facts rather than doctrines, and practical details told with straightforward, energetic, manly simplicity.

Of passages peculiar to Mark are Mar 3:20-21, Christ's friends' attempt on Him; Mar 4:26-29, parable of the seed growing secretly; Mar 7:31-37, healing the deaf mute; Mar 8:22-26, gradual cure of the blind; Mar 11:11; Mar 14:51-52; Mar 16:7, the special message to Peter after the resurrection, to cheer him in his despondency after the thrice denial. Only twice Mark quotes Old Testament himself (Mal 3:1; Isa 40:3), namely, Mar 1:2; Mar 1:3; but often introduces Christ and those addressing Him quoting it. The Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and Alexandrinus manuscripts omit Mar 15:28, which is an interpolation from Luk 22:37. Mark alone has "the sabbath was made for man" (Mar 2:27), and the scribe's admission that love is better than sacrifices (Mar 12:33); all suited for Gentile readers, to whom Peter, notwithstanding subsequent vacillation, first opened the door (Acts 10).

From the Latinisms, and the place where, and the persons to whom it was written, it was thought originally to have been in Latin; so the Syriac version states, and many Greek manuscripts, "it was written in Rome, in the Roman language." But Mark's assuming his readers' acquaintance with Jewish localities is opposed to the opinion that he wrote at Rome (after Peter's departure from or decease in that city) which John Presbyter and Irenaeus endorse. In the New Testament record of Paul's labors in and for Rome no allusion occurs to Peter in connection with Christianity there. The internal evidence of Mark's Gospel is in favor of its being early in date; this it could not be if it were written after any supposed date of Peter's having preached at Rome. If Peter ever was at Rome it must have been after Paul's two years spent in Rome, and after the writing of Acts which records it. Paul and Luke, the writer of Acts (Acts 28), evidently knew nothing of Peter having founded a church there.

All is clear, if Mark wrote the Gospel in connection with the Roman Caesarea. Here Peter first preached, and it was for his converts that Mark, his son in the faith, wrote a Gospel suited in style to the energetic character of their nation, and embodying the teaching of the first apostolic missionary to them, Peter. In exact agreement with the date which this would presume, Eusebius (Chronicle) fixes on the third year of Claudius, A.D. 43, shortly after Cornelius' conversion, a date when certainly Peter was not at Rome notwithstanding Eusebius' statement, to which he probably was led by the early circulation of Mark's Gospel at Rome by Roman converts passing there from Caesarea; hence probably originated the story of Peter's visiting Rome.

Possibly the last 12 verses of Mark 16, not found in the Sinaiticus and the Vaticanus manuscripts but found in the Alexandrinus manuscript, were added at the later date assigned by Irenaeus, i.e. A.D. 64. This will agree with Mar 16:20, "they went forth and preached everywhere," which implies that by this time the apostles had left Judaea and had preached in most lands, though they had not done so before the Gospel itself was written. As Matthew's Gospel, adapted to Jewish readers, and probably written in and for Jerusalem or Judaea, answers to the earliest period (Acts 1-11), the Hebrew period ending about A.D. 40, so Mark answers to the second or Judaeo-Gentile period, A.D. 40 to 50, and is suited to Gentile converts such as the Roman soldiers concentrated at Caesarea, their head quarters in Palestine, the second center of gospel preaching as Jerusalem was the first, and the scene of Cornelius' conversion by Mark's father in the faith, Peter.