104 Items
The Deir Mar Musa Censer
This is the text of a lecture given on the occasion of a facsimile of the censer taken from Deir Mar Musa by Richard Burton in the C19th being returned to the Community at a reception at the British Council in Damascus on September 27th 2001. The images cannot be included as the copyright for those rests with the British Museum.
Type: Text
Tags: An Nabk, British Museum, Censer, Deir Mar Musa, Mar Musa al-Habashi, Monastery, Nabk, Richard Burton, St. Moses, St. Moses the Abyssinian, St. Moses the Ethiopian, Syria
Dayr Mar Elian: A Monastery of the al-Qalamun, Syria. Historical Background and Project Summary, Les Annales Archéologiques Arabes Syriennes, vol. 45-46 (2002-2003), pp. 419-424
This is the final draft of a paper published in Les Annales Archéologiques Arabes Syriennes.
Type: Text
Tags: Archaeology, Dayr Mar Elian, Dayr Mar Elian Archaeological Project, Excavation, Mar Elian, Mar Elian esh-Sharqi, Monastery, Syria, Syrian Civil War
Monastic Archaeology in Syria (2): the 2004 season at Dayr Mar Elian esh-Sharqi, Qaryatayn, Syria
This is the report (unpublished) of the final season of the Dayr Mar Elian Archaeological Project (DMEAP). It was submitted for publication to Levant but the manuscript was overlooked when the publication changed editorial staff and material was lost in the move.
Type: Text
Tags: Archaeology, Dayr Mar Elian, Excavation, Mar Elian, Mar Elian esh-Sharqi, Monastery, Qaryatayn, Reliquary, Syria, Syrian Civil War
Semandağ
The monastery of St. Simeon Stylites the younger was said to stand on the "miraculous mountain", possibly because it was near Mt. Cassius which was a pagan holy mountain. Even today there is an Alawite shrine further down the mountain from the ruins of the monastery. Simeon the younger was a sixth century imitator of his fifth century namesake, Simeon the elder, and a complex of buildings appears to have sprung up around his pillar even during his lifetime. In his vita there is mention of Georgian followers settling at the site and later on they appear to have run their own monastery-within-a-monastery at the site. The modern name for the ruins translates as "Simeon's mountain."
Type: Architecture
Tags: Architecture, C6th, Church, Monastery, Pillar, Semandaǧ, Simeon Stylites the Younger, Stylite, Turkey
Kursi Church, Galilee
The monastic complex of Kursi is located to the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee and is identified as Gergessa or the Land of the Gadarenes of the New Testament where the Miracle of the Swine took place. The complex was built between the end of the 5th to the mid 6th Century and was fortified by a surrounding wall. It features a church with a large apse at the end of the nave, two side aisles and the later additions of a baptistery and crypt. The floors were paved with mosaics of geometric designs, floral motifs, fruits and birds. The large cistern, bath complex and oil press for the production of holy oil suggests that Kursi was once a popular Late Antique pilgrimage destination. It suffered much damage during the Persian invasion of the 7th Century.
Type: Architecture
Tags: Architecture, Baptismal Font, Baptistery, Basalt, Bath, Bird, Bread Basket, C5th-C6th, Christ, Christian, Church, Cistern, Column, Cross, Foliage, Fruit, Galilee, Geometric Motif, Greek Inscription, Holy Site, Israel, Kursi, Monastery, Mosaic, Oil Press, Pilgrimage, Wall
Dayr Seman north west monastery
This monastery is in a more ruined condition than its counterpart and stands apart from the rest of the village, with a view of the bottom of the triumphal way leading up to Qalat Seman.
Type: Architecture
Tags: Architecture, Church, Dayr Seman, Jebel Seman, Limestone Massif, Monastery, Pilgrimage, Qalat Seman, Syria
Dayr Seman south west monastery
This is one of two monastery complexes in Dayr Seman, which when it was visited and photographed in 1997 was in a very good state of preservation and partially inhabited by a Kurdish family. The Directorate General of Antiquities and Museums (DGAM) later evicted them, but it may now be reinhabited.
Type: Architecture
Tags: Architecture, Church, Dayr Seman, Inscription, Jebel Seman, Limestone Massif, Monastery, Pilgrimage, Qalat Seman, Syria, Syriac, Syriac Inscription
Dayr Tell Ada
Dayr Tell Ada stands on the southern slopes of Jebel Sheikh Barakat (the Mountain of the Old Man of Blessings) and plays a large role in the history of the Syrian Orthodox Church. It was mentioned by Theodoret and other chroniclers as the place where Simeon Stylites began his monastic career, before being expelled for the extreme feats of mortification that he insisted on undertaking. It was a 'dual house' for both Syriac and Greek speakers and had two abbots - one for each language - at the time of Theodoret.
It later became the home of St Jacob of Edessa, who died at Tell Ada in 708 having returned to pack up his fabled library when he moved home to Edessa.
Type: Architecture
Tags: Architecture, Dayr Tell Ada, Edessa, Greek, Jebel Seman, Jebel Sheikh Barakat, Library, Limestone Massif, Monastery, Simeon Stylites, St. Jacob of Edessa, Syria, Syriac, Theodoret
Bab al Hawa
Bab al Hawa means the gate of the winds and is the main border point between Antakya and Aleppo. A late antique monastery stands in no-mans land between the two passport and customs offices.
Type: Architecture
Tags: Aleppo, Antakya, Antioch, Architecture, Bab el Hawa, Late Antique, Limestone Massif, Monastery, Syria, Turkey
Dayr Yakub
Dayr Yakub is a C5th monastery on the edge of the suburbs to the south of Urfa. The monastery is built on the top of a hill above an ancient quarry and clearly appropriated the site of a former pagan sanctuary. The earlier cult complex was also used as a necropolis as well as a place of sacrifice as a Palmyrene-style tomb tower, complete with a Syriac inscription, was incorporated into the later monastery buildings.
Type: Architecture
Tags: C5th, Dayr Yakub, Edessa, Inscription, Monastery, Necropolis, Palmyra, Quarry, Syriac, Syriac Inscription, Tomb Tower, Turkey, Urfa