Deir Seman
Coordinates: 36 ° 20 ′ 0 ″ N , 36 ° 50 ′ 0 ″ E
Deir Seman , Arabic دير سمعان, DMG Dayr Simʿān , in ancient times Telanissos; was an early Byzantine city in the Dead Cities area in northwest Syria . It experienced its heyday in the 5th and 6th centuries as a supply base for the pilgrimage center Qal'at Sim'an (Simeon Monastery).
location
Deir Seman is located in Aleppo Governorate , about 34 kilometers northwest of Aleppo on the road via Dar Taizzah to Afrin . The ruins of the former city extend over a karst plain on the edge of the Jebel Halaqa, part of the northern Syrian limestone massif directly below the hill on which the Simeons monastery is located. Remains of the once prosperous trading center of Refade have been preserved almost three kilometers to the southwest . In contrast to the barren hills in the area with only a small layer of soil, grain cultivation is possible on some fields in the vicinity. In addition, the residents of the few modern houses keep sheep and cows, which seek shelter in the ruins. As in ancient times, olive trees flourish throughout the region.
history
Deir Seman was a village settlement in the 4th century whose main source of income was the cultivation of olives. The place was on the Roman road that led from Kyrrhos in the north to the south. A road branched off nearby to the west to Antioch.
Monasticism has been documented in Syria since the beginning of the 4th century, and Deir Seman has had a monastery since the beginning of the 5th century at the latest. A strict ascetic, who later became famous as Symeon Stylites the Elder , entered the monastery of Teleda (Tell 'Āde) in Jebel Siman around 402, after 10 years moved to the only monastery of Deir Seman at that time and spent there from there 412 three years. Because of his strict ascetic practices he had to leave the monastery, which is why he went to the nearest hill and from now on spent the last 37 years of his life on a pillar. There were pious men venerated as saints during their lifetime, whose relics were kept posthumously, but none achieved such a great impact among contemporaries and during the centuries that followed. Symeon attracted crowds of pilgrims whom he judged, cured them of illnesses or predicted natural disasters, and finally evangelized them. Around 476, the construction of a large pilgrimage site began around its column, the architectural model of which was the recently completed basilica of Qalb Loze .
Especially in Antiochene, the northern administrative region of the limestone massif belonging to Antioch , countless imitators followed the example of Symeon, became stylites and created a place of pilgrimage at the place of their asceticism. For the pilgrimage tourism that grew in this way, which reached its peak in the region from the 5th to the 7th centuries, an appropriate infrastructure had to be created at the respective locations.
Symeon remained at the center of worship. The village of Deir Seman at the foot of the Qal'at Sim'an grew into one of the only three cities within the limestone massif next to Brad , the ancient Kaprobarada on the Jebel Siman, and Al-Bara (Kapropera) in the south. From this time on there were three monasteries in the village and two large pilgrim hostels, which were built between 470 and 480, and the monasteries themselves also offered accommodation to pilgrims. Souvenirs were sold along the main street, including clay bottles ( ampullae ) with holy water or oil.
The Christian towns and villages of the mountainous country were not destroyed by the Arab conquest in the first half of the 7th century. Only in the course of the following centuries did the inhabitants gradually migrate. In the 9th century, the region came under the control of the Byzantines again, the pilgrimage site Qal'at Sim'an was expanded into a fortress and thus received its name ( Qal'at means "castle"). At the beginning of the 11th century they were ousted by the Fatimids . Deir Seman remained a place of pilgrimage until the Middle Ages. A new settlement probably only took place around 1900 by settling nomad families.
Cityscape
During its time as a supply center for the pilgrims, Deir Seman grew to a diameter of one kilometer due to immigrants. Most of the pilgrims were accommodated in the village, in the pilgrimage center on the hill there was only a guest house in the area of the baptistery at the southern entrance. The three large monastery complexes were in the north-west, south-west and south-east of the city. The north-western monastery was probably built on the site of the simple earlier monastery in which Symeon had stayed. The facilities each included a basilica and a pilgrims' hostel (pandocheion). The south-eastern monastery from the end of the 6th century is best preserved. The two two-story communal buildings had porticos in front of the facades, separated from them was a building for the monks' apartments, while the small church was housed in an extension. The churches of the other two monasteries that were built earlier were large, separate structures. The pilgrim hostels, like the other residential buildings, were two-story and arranged around courtyards of different sizes. The prosperity of the place is also evident in a three-storey residence with a pillared vestibule.
It is assumed that the pilgrims gathered to walk together to the isolated north church, the largest sacred building in the city, then through the (preserved) triumphal arch at the eastern end of the village and further up the processional street ( via sacra ) to Qal'at Sim'an .
literature
- Christine Strube : The "Dead Cities". Town and country in northern Syria during late antiquity. Verlag Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 1996, pp. 59 f, 69, 73, ISBN 3805318405
- Howard Crosby Butler: Early Churches in Syria. Fourth to Seventh Centuries. Princeton University Press, Princeton 1929, pp. 105–109 (new edition: Amsterdam 1969)
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Johannes Odenthal: Syria. High cultures between the Mediterranean and the Arabian desert. DuMont, Cologne 1994, p. 219