"Suffered Under Pontius Pilate"

Have you ever wondered about the significance of the phrase "suffered under Pontius Pilate" in the Apostles' Creed? Why mention Pilate? Why the reference to him in a creedal confession of the Christian faith? This quote from Harold Brown may help explain why this phrase has importance:

Jesus is...the Mediator between God and man, but he is not seen as a cosmic or universal principle, but as a real flesh-and-blood human being, who suffered, died, and rose again under a real, historical, and trivial Roman official, Pontius Pilate. During the early twentieth century, attempts were made to deny the historicity of Jesus Christ, and to present him as the invention of his followers, but there has never been an attempt to discredit the historicity of the unfortunate Pilate.

--Harold O. J. Brown, Heresies: Heresy and Orthodoxy in the History of the Church

The historicity of Pilate confirms the historicity of Christ.