- 1 Al‑Kaʿbī 2012; Müller-Wiener & Siegel 2018; Talbot Rice 1932, 1934; in this volume, Jullien 2022.
- 2 The Japanese team who excavated the site misspelled the toponym of the site as Ain Sha’ia (Fujii et (...)
1Christianity probably spread in Iraq in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD and then spread among the Arabs of al‑Ḥīra and the Arabian Peninsula. Historical sources suggest that Christianity had become firmly established in Mesopotamia by the 3rd century, particularly in the Edessa area (Urhoy in Syriac and al‑Ruhā in Arabic) which became a cultural centre for Syriac Christianity early on. Historically, the Christians of Iraq, especially the Syriacs, played an important role in translation, science and medicine. In particular they translated from Greek, Syriac and Persian. Despite the importance of Christianity in Iraq, very few ancient Christian settlements have been excavated. One of the most developed centres of Christianity was the city of al‑Ḥīra, capital of the Naṣrid within the Sasanian area of influence; it was composed of several monasteries, mentioned in the texts, and partially excavated.1 In the vicinity of this urban centre there was also a spread Christian settlements, in particular in the area of ʿAyn Šāyʿa,2 as well as at al‑Quṣayr and Raḥḥālīya, south and west of the Baḥr al‑Milḥ, modern Lake Razāza (fig. 1). The site of al‑Quṣayr, around 190 km from al‑Ḥīra, is of particular interest for the study of early monasticism in the region. Its church is very specific and the remains are quite visible from the surface, offering the opportunity to draw hypotheses on the whole settlement.
Fig. 1 – Map of the Christian settlements in southern Iraq and north of the Gulf.
2The present article proposes a synthesis of the previous work undertaken by a German team that surveyed the area in 1973 and the work of two Iraqi archaeological teams which excavated the site in 1978 and in 2009. It also presents new descriptions and documentation of the site, in particular drawings, photographs and a 3D restitution of the church. This work has led to new hypotheses on the phasing of the church. It was clearly built first as a long and narrow single-nave church with multiple doors. It was then enlarged, most probably to match the model of pilgrimage monastic churches. A part of the church was finally used for conventual activities and probably became a scriptorium and a library. The study also offers information on what type of monastery this was, probably a mixed monastery with monks living outside of the coenobium wall. This article is the result of a collaboration between an architect, who did fieldwork on the site, and an archaeologist, who was not able to access it yet but who is familiar with al‑Quṣūr (Faylakā Island, Kuwait), a site that has many similarities with al‑Quṣayr.
Fig. 2 – Satellite image of al‑Quṣayr (Karbalā region, Iraq).
3The first to mention the ruins of al‑Quṣayr was most probably Louis Massignon. He referred very briefly to his visit to the tells of “Qoṣayr” on the 23th of March, 1908, the day he visited al‑Uḫayḍir for the first time, and he also located the site on his map.3 In his estimation it was an “important village”. He was most probably referring to the church when mentioning that only one tell “still supports a wall section, without character”. A few years later, Gertrude Bell visited the site of “Qseir”, on the 3rd of March, 1911, in the context of excavations at al‑Uḫayḍir: “I do not doubt that it was here they got the jus [gypsum] for the castle. There are traces of a good deal of building and one oblong building stands. Also many square tanks dug out probably for the storing of jus [gypsum]”.4 She does not mention the church but took five photographs of this building:5 two of the outside of the sanctuary (southeast corner and south wall), two of the eastern part of the sanctuary (a general view from the west fig. 3a and a detail of the squinch and coating decoration, fig. 3b), and one from the windows preserved in the northern part of the nave northern wall.
Fig. 3 – Remains of the sanctuary of the church in 1911 during Bell’s visit (view from the west).
a) General view; b) Detail of the squinch that supported a cupola and coating decoration.
Pictures P_206 & P_207, Gertrude Bell Archive, Newcastle University.
4The first study of the site was carried out in 1973 by a team from the Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts Baghdad as part of a survey to the west of the Euphrates, in the area of Tulūl al‑Uḫayḍir. They identified two churches (named A and B) and a monastery surrounded by a village. The team did not undertake excavation but described the remains and documented them. They published a schematic plan of the monastery and two churches, as well as a schematic plan of two types of domestic buildings. They also published drawings of the inside elevation of the central aisle and of the northern and eastern wall of the sanctuary, as well as a plan, a section and a restitution. Four general photos of the stone part of the church and four detailed photos show that the site had not deteriorated much since Bell’s visit.
- 6 For the 1978 excavation, see Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182. For the 2009 excavation, see Abd al‑Rahe (...)
5The site was finally excavated by the Iraqi State Organization for Antiquities and Heritage in 1978, and in 2009 by the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage. Though only the main results of the first excavation are mentioned briefly in a general report about archaeological activities in Iraq, a report of the second excavation was published in 2016.6 The first project was based on the excavation of many areas surrounding of the church on the east, west and south sides, while the second project excavated the church itself. Consolidation work was also undertaken by the second team, in particular in the sanctuary.
6In 2010, as part of an architectural survey, H. Atiyah visited and documented settlements from Late Antiquity and the Islamic periods in the Provinces of al‑Nağaf and Karbalā. One of the aims of his fieldwork was to relate the sites surveyed by the Department of Antiquities with the names of settlements mentioned in historical sources. The sites visited during this project were al‑Uḫayḍir fortress, the beacon of Mawğada, the site of Ḫān al‑ʿAṭšān, al‑Bardawīl tower, the monastery of al‑Quṣayr, the caves of al‑Ṭār, al‑Ruhbān castle, and other unexcavated historical hills. At al‑Quṣayr, the fieldwork included photographing of the whole site with a drone (the maximum height was about 300 m above sea level) and documenting the church.7 The church was recorded and registered by measuring and photographing the building that is visible above ground and the remains of the walls. The documentation obtained during the fieldwork was treated to draw the remains of the central part of the site, located in the large enclosure wall. A 3D model of the remains was reconfigured to create a 3D restitution of the church on SketchUp. The site was visited a second time, in 2021, for the writing of this article.
- 8 The co‑ordinates of al‑Quṣayr are 32°29’52.68”N / 43°34’31.70”E.
- 9 This is the current distance to the lake but its level has decreased a lot in recent years so the s (...)
7The site is 8 km from ʿAyn al‑Tamr and 6.5 km from al‑Uḫayḍir fortress.8 It is currently situated in a hot desert climate, near a sebkha, and 12 km away from Lake Razāza/Baḥr al‑Milḥ.9 A dried river currently divides the site into two parts and partially destroyed it (figs. 2, 5). In the absence of geomorphological and archaeobotanical studies, it is impossible to reconstruct the paleoenvironment of the settlement. Al‑Quṣayr is composed of a central area, including a church, enclosed by large walls and surrounded by many domestic buildings and what was previously identified as another church. The excavations were focused on the enclosed area and the churches, but many remains are visible on the surface that allow hypotheses to be drawn.
Fig. 4 – Aerial photograph of al‑Quṣayr settlement.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 5 – Aerial photograph of the church, the northeastern part of the coenobium, what could be a funerary chapel and the graves.
H. Atiyah.
- 10 A complete survey would, of course, be necessary to make an accurate count of the buildings and to (...)
- 11 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 27.
- 12 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
8The whole site covers an area of around 34.70 ha (0.90 EN/WS × 0.60NW/SE km). The urban grid is really dense and tightly packed with a count of around 190 units based on aerial views (figs. 2, 4).10 As already noted by Finster and Schmidt, there is no “strictly defined planning scheme”11 but the whole settlement is organized homogeneously. The buildings are quadrangular, very close together and separated by what were probably streets. Most of them are separated by streets on their four sides while some of them, in particular in the western part, seems to have been built with their long sides adjoining, with streets along their short sides. According to first Iraqi excavations, a “stone-built quay wall” was discovered along the eastern side of the river, “except north of the gateway where the west side was protected by a row of tall jars”.12 But these structures are impossible to locate now.
- 13 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 38, fig. 12, type B.
- 14 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 37.
9Most of the buildings that surround the central part of the settlement are similar. According to the German report, only two buildings are different13 but a systematic survey would be necessary to confirm this. The domestic units are rectangular and consist of two roughly equal parts: to the south, a covered part with three rooms and, to the north, an uncovered courtyard delimited by a wall. The southern part is divided between a large oblong room covering the west half and two smaller, roughly equal rooms covering the eastern half. Most of the building seems to be 30 or 40 m long on their long side. Only a few seem to be 50 m long, according to the surface remains. According to Finster and Schmidt, “the level of the courtyard is far below that of the street. It appears as if the courtyards were cut into the natural rubble stone hills and only enclosed with a wall above ground.”14 At al‑Quṣūr, the domestic units are higher than the courtyard because they are built of mud-bricks on a stone base without foundations, directly on a natural layer that was used as an outside floor. Once the walls have melted, the house appears to be higher than the surrounding. The same phenomenon might be taking place at al‑Quṣayr.
- 15 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 35, fig. 6.
- 16 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
- 17 Salles & Callot 2013: pp. 242‒249, figs. 5‒9; Bonnéric 2021, pp. 55–56, fig. 2/A2.
- 18 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
10Less than 30 m to the east of the church, a long building was identified by the German team as an older church because of the similarity of the plan visible on the surface to that of a single-nave church (fig. 5).15 It was named church B and could have been the model for the better preserved later one, which was called church A. The first Iraqi team “examined” it but absolutely no information was published about its shape.16 Its western end was partially disturbed by the river. According to the German description, it seems that it is a very elongated building with a single long room to the west and a smaller, almost squared, room to the east. No remains of mud-brick aisles similar to the western church were described in the area of the church by the Iraqi excavators, who mentioned only graves. This plan seems to match the plan of a building discovered at al‑Quṣūr in a similar location, directly east of a three-nave church and could also be a conventual building dedicated to the spiritual education of the monks.17 As at al‑Quṣūr, the size of this building is very similar to the size of the main aisle and sanctuary of the church. The German team also described the state of this building before its excavation: a floor bordered by stone courses and a larger pile of collapsed stone at the eastern end of the building. The German excavators interpreted the latter as a collapsed cupola. However, the survey by the Iraqi excavation team revealed that the building is divided into more than two rooms. The poor state of preservation of the building does not allow an accurate reconstruction of its plan to be drawn up (figs. 6‑7), but it is clearly different from the plan of al‑Quṣūr. Another difference is that it is outside the coenobium (see below). The presence of graves north, east and south of al‑Quṣayr building might also indicate that is was a funeral chapel. The number of graves is not mentioned but the survey showed that more than 30 graves were excavated. According to the excavators, some of them were characterized by a “low brick superstructures incorporating a small gypsum panel with an elaborately carved and painted cross”.18 This is the only Christian cemetery excavated in Iraq and the Gulf but unfortunately the documentation is not available. The graves are probably related to the building since they are surrounding its eastern part and follow the same east orientation as the building. A recent visit to the site, in 2021, showed that the elongated building is clearly 8.30 m wide and probably 31 m long. From the surface, it is difficult to understand the length of the building because of looting. Contrary to previous descriptions, it seems that it could be an elongated, multi-room building. Its eastern end could be divided into three rooms (figs. 5, 7). An entrance with steps is visible to the north. Fieldwork would be necessary to complete this information.
- 19 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 37.
11Al‑Quṣayr settlement is very homogeneous, the domestic units following a similar pattern, orientation and proportion. Finster and Schmidt were already surprised by the absence of an urban centre and public buildings outside the monastery and church B.19 And indeed, all the buildings seem identical, except the two areas in the centre of the settlement, on both sides of the river, the so‑called monastery with church A to the west and the so‑called church B to the east. This fact is very important for understanding the nature of the site, as we will see below.
Fig. 6 – The so‑called church B, that may be a funerary chapel, view from the north‑west.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 7 – The eastern end of the building that may be a funerary chapel (so‑called church B) east of the church, view from the north, showing traces of looting.
H. Atiyah.
- 20 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
12An area of 1.59 ha (110 E/W × 150 m N/S) surrounding this church is enclosed in a large wall built of mud-bricks on a stone base20 punctuated by circular or semi-circular buttresses to support the height of the wall (figs. 8‑9). Four semi-circular buttresses are still visible against both the northern and southern walls and eight on the western wall, while there are probably five on the eastern wall and at least two at the northwest and southwest corners. The five corners of the enclosure are built with a circular buttress. The area is not strictly quadrangular since the eastern wall seems to follow the bed of the river.
Fig. 8 – A tentative 3D reconstruction of the coenobium.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 9 – One of the mud-brick buttresses built against the western wall of the coenobium enclosure in its current state.
H. Atiyah.
- 21 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 36.
13A gate is visible in the eastern wall and was excavated. According to the German team, it was in stone,21 but, according to the survey, it was clearly built of mud-bricks mixed in some places with stones. The gate seems to cut the mud-brick enclosure wall. It is protruding on the outside (figs. 5, 10a) and consists of one room on the inside (figs. 5, 10b). It is impossible to see what system was used to close the gate.
Fig. 10 – The gate of the coenobium.
a) Outside part, view from the northeast; b) Inside part, view from the west.
H. Atiyah.
- 22 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
- 23 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 36, fig. 6, pl. 13.
14According to the report of the first Iraqi project, in 1978, a bath was discovered south of the area and a “residential unit” was unearthed in the southwest corner as well as “a small chapel” with Syriac inscriptions but there are no plans or photographs.22 The area between the northeast corner, the church and the gate was also excavated. Two large courtyards are visible (figs. 5, 9). A courtyard (13.3 × 13.6 m) appears directly east of the church, against the sanctuary. A circular structure, maybe a well, was excavated in the middle. Another courtyard (12.7 × 13.4 m) also appears in the northeast corner of the rampart. Ten rooms are also visible to the east and south of this courtyard. A large building that was not excavated was noted by Finster and Schmidt to the southwest of the church and described as large and symmetrical.23 According to aerial photographs, it is a long quadrangular building, roughly as long as the church. If the walls enclose a monastery, this building could be a conventual building, maybe a refectory, as we will suggest below.
- 24 Abd al-Raheem 2016, p. 58, pl. 7/1‑2.
- 25 Bonnéric 2021, pp. 51–55, fig. 3.
- 26 Steve 2003, p. 116, fig. 14, pl. 63/1.
15Some rooms or areas are also related to the church but probably not to its liturgy. To the south, the longitudinal aisle gives access to a group of three rooms to the east and at least one room to the west. The eastern room is smaller and may have supported another floor as attested by a staircase. The other two rooms were identified as a place for “services and cooking food”. However, they also described numerous niches in the walls of the medium room, the one with the stairs (fig. 11).24 The niches were interpreted as shelves. They vary in shape (covered by a lintel or by an arch) and in dimension. One of them is based at floor level. A comparison with the monasteries of Khārk and al‑Quṣūr are more suggestive of a library than a refectory. At both sites, the refectories are large buildings characterized by a portico surrounding an oblong room with benches along the walls for the monks to sit.25 Refectories in monasteries in Palestine and Egypt, even if their plans are different, were also identified thanks to seats, which are not apparent in this part of al‑Quṣayr church. On the contrary, five rooms were identified at Khārk as a library thanks to the presence of niches in the wall.26 There, the niches are very standardized but the function of the niches at al‑Quṣayr, even if their shape is irregular, was probably to store books. So, some reddish material contained in a jar, according to the Iraqi excavators, was perhaps not intended for food consumption as suggested but was perhaps intended as a pigment for a scriptorium. The surface area of the room that could have been a library is very small but the stairs would have provided access to a second storey that may also have be part of the library and offered more storage niches. A very narrow and long room was built against the eastern wall of the sanctuary. The rooms in the southeast corner give access to a series of rooms that may also be related to the church. It is impossible to identify their function.
Fig. 11 – Niches in the room with stairs built on the south side of the church, against its southern aisle.
H. Atiyah.
- 27 The plaster or gypsum cannot be distinguished by the naked eye and archaeologists frequently used p (...)
- 28 No photograph or drawing of the stuccoes were published. In the Iraq Museum, some stucco panels wit (...)
- 29 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 65.
- 30 Roaf & Postgate 1981, p. 182.
16The church is the best-preserved building at the site (figs. 12‑13). Although the ceiling has disappeared, the stone walls are very well preserved, sometimes to a height of 2.6 m. The mud-brick walls are less well preserved, but still stand between 1.5 m and 2 m high. The stone walls are built in double facing with stone filling, the facing stones being mid-sized and roughly dressed, with an earth mortar. The walls and the floors were covered with a plaster or gypsum coating.27 Decorated stucco fragments were discovered mainly near the doors of the aisles.28 Traces of painting were noticed,29 as well as Syriac inscriptions in the central aisle.30 The survey revealed crosses engraved in the wall coating of the door between the central aisle and the sanctuary (fig. 14). The building was mainly described as a simple-nave stone church but it also consisted of mud-brick aisles discovered by Iraqi team to the north, the south and the west of the central aisle.
Fig. 12 – Sketch plan of the church, view from the west.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 13 – The church, view from the west.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 14 – Crosses engraved in the wall coating of the door opening from the central aisle to the sanctuary.
H. Atiyah.
- 31 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 57.
- 32 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 28, figs. 8, 10.
- 33 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 30, fig. 10.
17The central aisle is very long and narrow (31.85 × 6.6m). It opens onto the northern and southern aisles by six narrow doors. Some socket holes in the coated thresholds suggested a closing system for the doors.31 Previous documentation shows that the doors were topped by an arch and that the northern and southern walls of the main aisle were probably lighted by seven windows each, placed between the doors (fig. 21).32 Finster and Schmidt suggested windows covered by an arc, but Abd al‑Raheem described windows supported by a lintel. According to the survey, the openings are rectangular but this would need to be checked by accessing the upper part of the wall. A single door (1.59 m wide) leads from the western transverse aisle to the central aisle and along a wider pathway (3.80 m wide) to the sanctuary. Finster and Schmidt suggested that this part of the building was probably 9‒9.50 high,33 but they may have overestimated it (maybe c. 7.50 m).
- 34 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 28, fig. 8; Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 54.
- 35 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 54.
- 36 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 54, pl. 3/2
- 37 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 54.
18The sanctuary (fig. 16) is an almost square room (6.7 × 6.3 m) that was covered by a cupola, as indicated by the remains of squinches (fig. 3b).34 A niche was built in the east wall, although the external facing is flat and not semi-circular. It was still partially preserved during Finster and Schmidt’s study and it was consolidated in 2009. In the floor of the niche, the archaeologists noticed some circular marks35 but no photograph was published and we do not know the diameter of the marks. They could be the traces of altar bases. They were no longer visible at the time of the survey. A window was built directly on the arch of the niche, in the centre of the eastern wall. The sanctuary was probably also illuminated by two windows each in the north and south walls. It was accessed by four doors, two each in the north and south walls: in the eastern part of the walls, the doors are very narrow (0.52 m wide) and in the western part, larger (0.8 m wide, 2.10 m high). The threshold of the eastern doors is much deeper than the threshold of the western ones (fig. 17). The eastern door of the northern wall of the sanctuary leads to the northeastern annex while the eastern door of the southern wall leads not to the annex but to a corridor-like room. Red coating was preserved on the walls of the sanctuary.36 At least the sanctuary, but probably the whole building, was decorated with a simple, sculpted coating. A photograph by Bell shows two undulated bands in gypsum or plaster: one is curved and located on the upper part of a squinch (fig. 3b), the other is horizontal and placed two courses up on the same squinch. Abd al‑Raheem also mentioned a zigzag decoration.37 Three successive plaster or gypsum floors were seen during excavation in the section of a looting hole.
Fig. 15 – An arched door in the northern wall of the central aisle, view from the south.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 16 – External facing of the northern wall of the sanctuary, view from the north.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 17 – Internal facing of the southern wall of the sanctuary, view from the north.
H. Atiyah.
- 38 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 56, pl. 4/4‑5.
- 39 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 57, fig. 3.
19The central aisle is framed to the north and south by lateral and longitudinal aisles and to the west by a transverse one. The western transverse aisle is long and narrow. It is open to the outside by three doors, one each in its west, north and south walls. The western door, in the middle of the church façade, is the larger entrance of the building (1.50 m wide). The southern and northern aisles are almost as long as the central one, but narrower (3.7 m for the north one and 4.25 m for the south one). The northern aisle opens on the transverse aisle by one door. No door appears between the transverse aisle and the southern longitudinal aisle in the current state but this aisle was probably modified with the construction of a room in its western end. Against the walls plaster or gypsum tables were discovered (fig. 18).38 According to the Iraqi archaeologists, some writing, identified as probably being Syriac, was discovered but what material the writing was on was not specified. A very large layer of bitumen, mentioned as “a bitumen floor” was discovered in the middle of the southern aisle, stopping at a later transverse wall that may have been a blocked door (fig. 19).39 This wall was added between the third and fourth doors and divided the southern aisle. The room was then identified as a library but may also have been a scriptorium (see below).
Fig. 18 – The room built during the third phase in the western part of the south aisle and the scriptorium (?) tables.
H. Atiyah.
Fig. 19 – Central part of the southern aisle cut by a wall with a blocked door and the floor covered with bitumen.
H. Atiyah.
- 40 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 62.
- 41 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 58.
- 42 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 55.
20Each lateral aisle gives access to an annex, north and south of the sanctuary. The northern annex is divided into two rooms, one to the west (4.6 × 3.9 m) and one to the east (4.7 × 4.1 m), each one opening on the sanctuary. The eastern room was identified as a sacristy because of the discovery of a low circular structure (0.45 m diam.) with traces of bitumen.40 It is located 0.85 m from the northwestern corner of the room (fig. 20). It is difficult to understand the structure but a baptismal basin seems excluded. In the southern annex three niches were built in the walls, two in the southern wall and one in the northern wall. An altar (0.76 × 0.84 m) can be restituted in the middle of the eastern wall thanks to holes remaining in the floor that are the negative of the support of the altar. It is not clear if the excavators discovered fragments of the table.41 The excavators noted a “deliberate sabotage” of the place. As we will see below, its function may have changed. It was interpreted as a baptistery because it is the southern room, but no basin nor any water draining system was unearthed that could justify this attribution. In the southern annex, fragments of bright red and purple coating were also discovered, probably from the walls.42
Fig. 20 – Circular structure in the northwestern corner of the northeastern annex.
H. Atiyah.
- 43 Finster & Schmidt 1976, figs. 8, 10.
21Several indications allow the roofing of the church to be restituted; it was characterized by different levels. The sanctuary was topped by a cupola, as indicated by the remaining superstructure, in particular the squinches. It is estimated as being 11 m high. According to the windows in the walls of the central aisle, it is most probable that the roof of the lateral aisles was lower than the bays and was probably made of tree trunks, palms and mud. The fact that the sanctuary windows are higher than the one in the central aisle suggests that the annex roof, probably flat, was higher than that of the lateral aisles. The central aisle had a higher ceiling. Finster and Schmidt suggested a flat roof43 but the width of central aisle is 9.6 m, making this space too wide to be roofed horizontally using traditional techniques. To distribute loads onto the side walls, the roofing probably took the form of a vault (fig. 21).
Fig. 21 – Tentative 3D reconstruction of the church.
H. Atiyah.
22What is unusual in this building is the fact that the walls between the central part of the church and its surrounding parts were made of mud-bricks on one face and stones on the other. These walls were interpreted as mixed masonry but they are most probably two walls built against each other since they are never linked. Technically, it does not make any sense to build a mud-brick facing and a stone facing without any links to structure the wall and ensure its cohesion and strength. Some evidence suggests that the mud-brick walls were built against a pre-existing stone building (fig. 22). Firstly, the stones and the mud-bricks are not linked, as attested by the facing of the stone walls that are visible below the brick where the coating has disappeared. Secondly, the width of the mud-brick walls and the stone walls is the same, in the whole building. Thirdly, only the long walls of the central aisle are doubled by a mud-brick wall, but not the smaller eastern and western walls. Fourthly, the southeast door of the sanctuary is blocked by a mud-brick wall: the door was certainly not built and blocked at the same time. It is most probable that the longitudinal aisles and corresponding annexes as well as the transverse aisle were built to the north, the west and the south against a pre-existing building. The plan of the building would thus be the result of construction in two different phases. The hypothesis of a change in building technique during a one-phase construction is unlikely: if the building had been built in stone at the beginning of the construction and then in mud-brick, the builders would have structurally linked the stone and mud-brick walls, but there is no such trace in the current remains.
Fig. 22 – The mud-brick wall of the northern aisle built against the stone wall of the central aisle.
H. Atiyah.
- 44 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 37.
- 45 Finster & Schmidt 1976; Abd al‑Raheem 2016. Simpson (2018) refers to a “walled town” and Okada (199 (...)
23For Finster and Schmidt, al‑Quṣayr was a very briefly occupied settlement.44 If the surrounding buildings apparently show no modification (but they have not been excavated yet), the church attests clearly that the occupation was long enough to considerably enlarge the building in a second phase of use, totally changing the shape of the building and most probably the way it was used. In its second phase, the church became very similar to a monastic pilgrimage church. In a third phase, the southern aisle was changed, probably into library and scriptorium. Al‑Quṣayr has mostly been interpreted as a monastery surrounded by a village.45 However, the shape of the “village” houses is very similar to monks’ cells and the whole site is most probably a composite monastery organized around a coenobium. The uniqueness of the first phase church raises questions and the attribution to an endogenous miaphysite community can be discussed but must stay very uncertain.
24In the absence of any detailed stratigraphy, the architectural remains show that the church was built in three phases. The differences between the first two phases are so important that effectively two churches are revealed by the architecture. The first church was a long but narrow building (383 m²), built in stone and consisting of a long nave, an almost square sanctuary and numerous doors on its long sides (fig. 23). If only one door was open in the west wall, then six provided access to the nave from the south and six from the north and two doors gave access to the sanctuary from the south and two from the north. In the current state of the knowledge, this building is unique in Iraq, as we will see below.
Fig. 23 – The two first phases of the church.
J. Bonnéric.
- 46 See in this volume: Bonnéric 2022a.
- 47 Okada 1992, pp. 90‒91.
25During the second phase, the building was enlarged on its four sides by the addition of rooms to cover an area almost twice as big (669 m²). The church then becomes a three-aisle church with a sanctuary and two annexes and one transverse aisle to the west. The plan is very similar to the churches of ʿAyn Šāyʿa and al‑Ḥīra V in Iraq and the churches of Khārk, al‑Quṣūr and Ṣīr Banī Yās in the Arab-Persian Gulf. These churches have a very specific plan, with numerous doors, allowing the possibility to circumambulate from one annex to another through the lateral and the transverse aisles and to isolate the central nave and the sanctuary with door panels that are absent from the outside doors. They could be monastic churches hosting pilgrimages, as suggested in particular by the possibility of circumambulation and the discovery of reliquaries and graves in the walls of other churches of southern Iraq and the Gulf (al‑Quṣūr, ʿAyn Šāyʿa and Khārk).46 Even if very similar in plan, there are some differences between the church at al‑Quṣayr in its second phase and the corpus of these five churches, in particular the number of doors. In the central and lateral aisles, as well as in the sanctuary, there are twice as many doors: six doors in each aisle wall at al‑Quṣayr against three at al‑Quṣūr and Khārk, and two doors in each north and south wall of the sanctuary against one. The proportions also are different. Yasuyoshi Okada showed that the churches of ʿAyn Šāyʿa, Khārk, and al‑Quṣūr had very similar proportions.47 The ratio between the length and the width of the central nave is between 1.84 and 1.92 in these churches while it is 4.82 at al‑Quṣayr. The central aisle of al‑Quṣayr is slightly longer than at Khārk (31.85 m vs. 28.7 m), but it is more than two twice as narrow (6.6 m vs. 15.5 m). Contrary to the probable pilgrimage monastic churches, the sanctuary is at the same level as the central aisle. It is, however, higher than the annexes, as at Khārk and al‑Quṣūr. These differences can be explained by the fact that, in order to expand the building, the builders had to adapt to the pre-existing church, namely a very long building with many doors. The objective was probably to be able to host monks and pilgrims, so they built the aisles with access to the annexes in which relics where probably kept. The pilgrims were probably able to access the relics but not the central aisle and the sanctuary. As in the churches at Khārk and al‑Quṣūr, it was possible at al‑Quṣayr to isolate the central part of the building (sanctuary and central aisle) by closing panels, while the surrounding doors had no closing system. During this phase, the settlement was probably a monastery, and it is quite possible that it was open to pilgrims during certain feasts.
- 48 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 57.
26In the third phase, the plan and the function of the southern aisle and annex changed. The southern aisle was divided into three rooms. After their excavation, the walls were not drawn brick by brick, so it is impossible to be sure which walls were linked to one another and thus contemporaneous, or not. The Iraqi excavators noted different mud-brick types48 but their description is not clear enough to draw a chronology by comparing these types. They considered the walls that divided the southern aisle to be later, which makes sense since their construction completely changed the internal organization of the building. They are also thinner than other walls. The southern aisle was now composed of three rooms: the western one is the smallest (6 × 3.2 m), the eastern one is the largest (4.4 × 5.5 m) and the surface area of the middle one is almost equivalent to both the others (4.3 × 27.8 m). The interpretation of the western room is difficult since the plaster equipment is built directly against the stone facing of the first phase church. It may mean that this room was already built when the mud-brick walls of the second phase were adjoined to the stone walls. A stratigraphic study is sorely missing here. The three rooms of the southern aisle were probably a scriptorium and a library. After the transformation of the southern aisle, the southern annex was no longer accessible to pilgrims and it may have been transformed into an annex of the library. That would explain the discovery of two niches in the southern wall and one in the northern wall. What was noted as a “deliberate sabotage” by Abd al‑Raheem may be the transformation of the room.
27Fieldwork to document the building techniques and the remaining stratigraphy would be necessary to understand the phasing and the different stages of construction better. Many facts remain unclear, such as the blocking of the door between the northern and the western aisles, the two very low eastern doors in the sanctuary, the phasing of the western room built in the southern aisle, etc.
- 49 Finster & Schmidt 1976, pp. 36‒37; Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 47.
- 50 In this volume: Bonnéric 2022a, p. 95‑119. See also: Bonnéric 2022b.
- 51 Steve 2003, pp. 87‒89, pl. 55, plan 11.
- 52 Bonnéric 2019; Bonnéric 2021.
28Because of the combination of a church and a large wall, the enclosed area was interpreted as a monastery by the previous researchers who studied the site.49 This area could indeed be a coenobium, even if, for now, only the church and the enclosure have been discovered, and no conventual buildings have clearly been identified yet. As we already mentioned, the church is very similar to a corpus of churches that have been discovered in monastic contexts.50 The settlement of Khārk was clearly a monastery, as indicated by the discovery of 70 monks’ cells, conventual buildings such as a refectory, a library and probably a scriptorium, and an enclosure wall surrounding the coenobium.51 At al‑Quṣūr, a refectory and one monk’s cell were discovered.52 At ʿAyn Šāyʿa and Ṣīr Banī Yās an enclosure wall was found. The church of tell V at al‑Ḥīra could be one of the monasteries mentioned in texts.
- 53 Bonnéric 2021, pp. 57–58, fig. 4
- 54 Steve 2003, pp. 87–91.
- 55 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 37.
29If the shape of the monastic church at al‑Quṣayr and the enclosure wall clearly suggest a coenobium, then the identification of the surrounding buildings raises questions. Their shape is similar to a cell discovered at al‑Quṣūr that is also composed of a covered half with two small adjoining rooms and one larger oblong room and a courtyard in the other half.53 It was identified as a cell by comparison with Khārk, where seventy cells were built side by side in the northwest corner of the coenobium.54 They are also tripartite but without a courtyard. They consist of a barlong room and two oblong rooms side by side perpendicular to the first one. At al‑Quṣayr, the proportions of the buildings vary but they are always tripartite. This tripartite plan and the fact it is almost the only type of building in the periphery suggest they are most probably monks’ cells. If they were not inhabited by families, it would explain why they did not evolve, with new developments and subdivisions. The absence of a centre, squares and community buildings, highlighted by Finster and Schmidt,55 would also easily be explained by the monastic nature of the site, since they would not be needed. The enclosed area would then be a coenobium, grouping the conventual buildings together inside a wall.
- 56 About the monastery of Gerasimos, see Hirschfeld 1990, pp. 18‒19. About the monastery of Choziba, s (...)
- 57 In this volume: Bonnéric 2022a, pp. 95‑119. See also: Bonnéric 2021, p. 57.
30The hypothesis of cells surrounding the enclosed area was not considered by previous researchers probably because of the wall that was interpreted as delimiting the whole monastery. However, some settlements attested the existence of composite monasteries, with monks also living outside the coenobium in Late Antiquity, in the Jordan Valley at the monastery of Gerasimos, and in the Judean Desert at the monastery of Choziba and the monastery of Calamon.56 In these monasteries, the coenobium, characterized by conventual buildings enclosed by a wall, is surrounded by monks’ cells that are of different shapes and are more or less distant from the coenobium. At Khārk and ʿAyn Šāyʿa, very few buildings were scattered around the coenobium. Even if they were probably related to the monastery, it was not a systematic organization, but rather some scattered anchorite dwellings. At al‑Quṣūr, around 230 units are irregularly scattered around the centre of the settlement that is not enclosed by a wall, according to current knowledge, but where the church and a refectory are located. Most of them were probably cells but their shape is not as homogeneous as at al‑Quṣayr. It is also possible that the monks created micro-communities organized inside small hermitages, like in the Kellia, since some buildings are much bigger than a three-room cell and composed of some units enclosed by a larger wall.57 At al‑Quṣayr, all the buildings seem to be similar and this phenomenon of extension is not visible yet, in the absence of excavation. It was probably not a lauritic community since the central part of the settlement is enclosed in a wall. This site is the clearest example of a composite monastery in the East-Syriac territory.
- 58 Abraham of Kaškar, Rule; Dadišoʿ, Rule.
- 59 Patrich 1995, pp. 296‒297.
- 60 Abraham of Kaškar, Rule, 8; Dadišoʿ, Rule, 4; Babai, Rules, 20‒23.
- 61 Dadišoʿ, Rule, 13.
- 62 Jullien & Jullien 2003; Jullien 2008; Salles 2011.
31East-Syriac monasticism was reconfigured by the reforms of Abraham of Kaškar in the 6th century and his rule and that of his disciple Dadišoʿ mention monks living around the coenobium.58 In the rule of Dadišoʿ, the monks of the coenobium are named the aḥe dbaqnubin and the monks of the periphery the aḥe dqelyata. The “cell dwellers” were part of the community as the coenobium dwellers59 and at al‑Quṣayr the proximity between the cells and the coenobium bears witness to this integration into a single community. According to the rules, the outside monks came at least once a week into the coenobium, and for feasts.60 New monks had to stay three years in the coenobium and then could obtain the authorization to build a cell outside.61 The configuration of the site visible on the surface may correspond to this period of reorganization of the monasteries in the 6th‒7th century.62
- 63 Abd al‑Raheem 2016, p. 65.
- 64 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 35.
- 65 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 39.
- 66 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 37.
32One of the issues concerning al‑Quṣayr is the dating of the site and its different phases since no material such as pottery, glass or even stucco has been published. The Syriac inscriptions could have given some dating indications but they were only mentioned and not published. The question of the dating, as we will see below, is also essential to be able to associate this community with a Christological school. Abd al‑Raheem compared the architecture of the building to others in order to date it. For example, he compared the size and the quality of the bricks. It led him to conclude that the construction was Sasanian.63 He suggests that the stucco decoration was influenced by “Islamic art”. Using architectural comparison, Finster and Schmidt also dated the building to the late Sasanian period,64 and considered that the so‑called church B was older than the western church. They related the construction of the enclosure wall to that of the western church. It is highly probable. For them, “the city was still inhabited when the church no longer served as a place of worship in later times”;65 the settlement should have emerged quickly and been abandoned abruptly.66 One of the arguments is that the houses were not altered or subdivided. While it is a valid argument for a village, it is not for a monastery. As already mentioned, the building in its second phase was very similar to a corpus of buildings that show homogeneous material culture (mainly pottery, stuccoes and glass) and date certainly from the Umayyad period and may have been built at the end of the late Sasanian era and abandoned at the beginning of Abbasid times. It seems these sites did not survive after the 9th century. In absence of any stratigraphical and material data, the comparison with this corpus is the only way to suggest a dating. The main occupation of the site, and the extension of the church, are probably contemporaneous and at least related to the Umayyad period, maybe the end of the Sasanian period. The first-phase church would then be earlier, but it is currently impossible to date.
- 67 About Ctesiphon churches, see Reuther 1929; about Ğubayl, see Langfeldt 1994.
- 68 Salles & Callot 2013, pp. 242‒249, figs. 5‑9; Bonnéric 2021, pp. 55–56.
- 69 Amin 2019, pp. 54‒57, and in this volume Harrak 2022, pp. 29‑69.
- 70 Finster & Schmidt 1976, p. 35; Sputler 1961, p. 186.
33The church in its first shape is intriguing from the point of view of its chronology and nature. Characterized by an elongated plan and thirteen doors on the nave, it is unique. There is no comparison with the buildings usually related to the dyophysite Church of the East. Although the churches of Ctesiphon (Iraq) and Ğubayl (KSA) consisted of a single aisle, this last was not narrow, it was very wide and the sanctuaries of these churches were also flanked by two annexes.67 A building excavated at al‑Quṣūr and interpreted as a church or as an educational building68 also consists of a single nave and a square room, but there is only one door in the western wall. The church of the Mar-Bena martyrion,69 between Kirkuk and Erbil, has a narrow single nave with a rectangular sanctuary. The main difference is the fact that there is just one door. In Iraq, the churches are mainly three-aisle churches, probably parish churches or monastic ones with pillar-walls or columns. We can wonder if the unique form of the building might suggest a community less present in the area, such as miaphysite. Finster and Schmidt already mentioned the fact that this church could be a “monophysite” one based on Spuler’s affirmation that early miaphysite churches were oriented to the east and had a single nave that was divided into a male and female section.70 However, this affirmation is not demonstrated and the early syro-occidental churches with a single aisle are not as long as the one at al‑Quṣayr and do not have so many doors. In fact, this church really does seem to be unique and differs from the single nave churches in the Middle East by its elongation and its many doors (17).
- 71 Pierre 2022; Fiey 1970.
- 72 In this volume: Pierre 2022, pp. 261‑287.
34Jean-Maurice Fiey then Simon Pierre postulate that the miaphysites had an endogenous Church in the eastern Syriac area.71 According to Pierre, there was a miaphysite syro-oriental community of monks that would have left to the north only at the turn of Islam. Prior to that, the area of ʿAqula, around al‑Ḥīra, would have be the place of a rivalry between dyophysite monks and those opposed to dyophysism.72 If so, the origin of the shape of the early miaphysite syro-oriental churches is not to be found by looking at miaphysite syro-occidental churches. Would it be possible that al‑Quṣayr’s first church is the only testimony of this endogenous miaphysite community in the region of al‑Ḥīra and that the settlement would became dyophysite at the turn of Islam? This very hypothetical explanation would explain this unique shape but it would imply that Christological consideration would have had an influence on the shape of a church, something that is, as yet, difficult to demonstrate. Especially since, as underlined by Pierre, the Christian population of the Sasanian Empire was probably not really concerned by these debates. The liturgy was probably still similar in the miaphysite and dyophysite churches. Other churches discovered in the area, such as Raḥḥāliyya church, may have been related to miaphysite Christians and have a common shape.
35Like the churches of ʿAyn Šāyʿa and al‑Ḥīra V in the region and Khārk, al‑Quṣūr and Ṣīr Banī Yās in the Gulf, the building at al‑Quṣayr consists of a transverse aisle to the west, three longitudinal aisles in the middle and three quadrangular rooms (the sanctuary squared by two annexes) to the east. However, it is the only church in the area where the central aisle and the sanctuary are built in stone while all the other walls are built in mud-brick. This study has shown that the stone part is the first church, with a single aisle and multiple openings. It is almost impossible to date, but it is pre-dates the second church and so it could have been built in the 6th century, maybe earlier. This church was widened in a second phase by the construction of two annexes and three aisles. The enlargement is also difficult to date and the only way is by comparison with other similar churches. It probably occurred at the end of the Sasanian or the beginning of Umayyad periods. In the third phase, the southern aisle was modified, probably with a conventual function. The second-phase church may have been built to host occasional pilgrims and a dyophysitic monastic community attached to the Church of the East. This monastery was organized between monks living in a community inside a coenobium enclosed by walls and monks living alone, in dispersed cells or hermitages, in the surroundings of the coenobium, following monastic rules that appeared in the 6th‒7th centuries. Although the composite nature of the monastery and the phasing of the church is well attested, the dating needs new excavations, and the identification of a miaphysite community is very complicated to ascertain.
36If the study of building techniques and architecture and comparison with other buildings has led to an initial phasing of the site, the lack of material and stratigraphic data make it difficult to refine and to date absolutely. Thorough archaeological field work would be absolutely necessary to understand what is probably the best-preserved example of a mixed community following the rules of the essential figure of Abraham of Kaškar. A conservation project would also be vitally important for this mud-brick site, which is rapidly deteriorating, literally dissolving, and occasionally looted. The site is not only one of the most important for historical research but it is also of great value, especially at the moment, both at the international level, which seeks cultural diversity in societies and at the local level through the need of a country, like Iraq, to strengthen the national cohesion that has existed throughout the ages by activating the role of the concept of peaceful coexistence and respect for others.