Mor Yakup Church

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Mor Yakup Church

The Mor Yakup Church (Turkish: Mor Yakup Kilisesii), also known as the Church of St. Jacob in Nisibis , is a historic Syrian Orthodox church in the Nusaybin District of Mardin Province in southeastern Turkey . Archaeological excavations have shown that the church building, which dates back to the 4th century, was originally the baptistery of a cathedral that no longer exists today . The church site, together with the nearby Zeynel Abidin mosque complex, was included in Turkey 's tentative list in 2014 as a candidate for UNESCO World Heritage in the culture category .

history

The church is located about 100 m east of the Zeynel-Abidin mosque complex. It is dedicated to the Syrian Jacob of Nisibis , who was elected Bishop of Nisibis in 309 and installed in the Church of the Virgin Mary in Diyarbakır . He had the church built between 313 and 320. It is considered to be one of the oldest churches in Upper Mesopotamia . According to some inscriptions and texts, the building was initially erected as a cathedral baptistery. It was converted into a church after the destruction of the cathedral and several other buildings.

architecture

The church building shows the characteristics of late Roman and early Byzantine architecture. It consists of two sections.

In the southern building there are two separate parts with two buttresses facing each other . In the eastern part there is a square plaza measuring 7 m × 7 m (23 ft × 23 ft) with two gates in the north and south walls. The east wall has an apse . On the west side an arched opening leads to the western part of the southern section. The eastern part shows wall decorations and friezes on the arches and the apse niche. Corinthian capitals adorn all buttresses except the western ones. It is likely that the central and western buttresses were added later. The western part of the building has arched doors that are decorated with fine ornaments on the north and south walls . Eight of the doors in the north and south walls have horseshoe-like arches. The arches and pillars are decorated with ornaments. An inscription in ancient Greek on the central frieze reads: “This baptistery was built with the support of Priest Akepsyma in 571 (359/360) when Volagesus was metropolitan. Let them be remembered before God. ”A dome, based on an inscription from 1872, covers the eastern square room. In the same year a chamber was added on the west side. Under the floor of the east square room there is a crypt with a sarcophagus believed to be the sarcophagus of Jacob of Nisibis.

The north part of the building was constructed using the north wall of the south part. The construction of the buttresses in this section, which can also be found in many church buildings in Tur Abdin in the same region, suggests that this part was built in the 8th century. It has the dimensions 7 m × 9.5 m. A third nave is on a mosaic- covered platform in front of the southern part.

Excavation and restoration

A project to restore the church building began in 2000. It was carried out by ÇEKÜL, the Foundation for Cultural Heritage, in collaboration with the Nusaybin Municipality and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism .

Excavation work was carried out in the area between the church and the mosque and in the churchyard. After a layer of rubble about 0.30 to 0.50 m deep had been removed, the pillar bases were exposed on a floor made of finely cut limestone. A masonry well that is four feet 11 inches deep and still contains water has three wells stacked on top of each other. This is likely due to the fact that the ground was covered in debris for all of the previous years. In the eastern part of the northern courtyard there is a stone-covered platform that can be reached via three steps. A sarcophagus with acroterion was discovered under the platform . The eastern courtyard is overgrown with trees. Tombs were found in the western courtyard and spread across the area after nearly 7 m of rubble was removed. The graves faced east-west and were built of rubble or spolia . The skeletons lay on their backs, their arms crossed on their chests, and their heads turned to the east. In particular, children's graves, objects such as glass bracelets, necklaces made of various pearls and braids were found. Tombs with late features reveal the Christian burial customs of the Assyrian people.

Seven illegally erected residential buildings in the area between the church and the mosque were expropriated and demolished by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism when it was found in 2007 and 2008 that the outbuildings of the church extended towards the mosque. The foundations of the original, defunct Nisibis Cathedral, which was one of the largest church buildings in the Middle East, as well as architectural structures from the Artuqid era (1101-1409) were unearthed. The excavations on an area of ​​5,000 square meters continued until 2014. Thousands of ceramic, metal, glass and stone artefacts found during the 15-year excavation were included in the 2017 results and analyzed and registered by a group of archaeologists, art historians and restorers from the Mardin Museum.

Web links

Commons : Saint Jacob of Nisibis church (Nusaybin)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Zeynel Abidin Mosque Complex and Mor Yakup (Saint Jacob) Church. In: whc.unesco.org. UNESCO World Heritage Center, accessed May 19, 2019 .

Coordinates: 37 ° 4 ′ 0.9 ″  N , 41 ° 12 ′ 54.9 ″  E