
Summary information
GPS coordinates: 32.32479, 36.36794
Structure is visible in Google maps.
The church was a small basilica with three naves (12.60 x 18.30 m) (fig. 141). It was accessed from the north and from the south by two doors which opened on the side aisles; no door opened onto the barracks to which the church was attached.
The naves were divided by two rows of pillars on which fell from the arcades. square windows are still visible in the clerestory wall (fig. 142). The building ended in a rectangular sanctuary provided with an axial niche and inscribed between two rooms side. The northern one opened onto the nave through a door. The restitutions differ for that of the south: Butler restored a room opening onto the collateral by an arch, which was then conserves, and on the sanctuary by a second arcade; the team of de Vries restores with more plausibility a partition between the room and the sanctuary. The corbels that supported the stone beams of the roof of the church were still visible when Butler passed by.
According to the plan published by de Vries’s team, the base for the chancel screen was identified in front of the sanctuary.
Anne Michel, Les Eglises d’Epoque Byzantine et Umayyade de La Jordanie V-VIII Siecle (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), 179–81.
The unusual part of the church is at the east end, where there is a chamber of the ordinary kind on the north of the rectangular sanctuary, but no chamber on the south side, the space for the prothesis being divided from the sanctuary and from the end of the aisle by arches. The arch of the sanctuary and these two arches of the prothesis are still standing, all three being carried by a single pier. The remains show conclusively that the whole church was covered by a flat roof at one level, the side aisles certainly with slabs of stone, and the middle aisle in the same manner, in all probability. The roofs of the sanctuary and side spaces were also of stone and on the same level.
Howard Crosby Butler and Enno Littmann, Syria: Publications of the Princeton University Archaeological Expeditions to Syria in 1904-1905 and 1909., vol. 2:A (Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1919), 191.
The construction of the church is subsequent to that of the barracks, which would have been erected in AD 412.
Anne Michel, Les Eglises d’Epoque Byzantine et Umayyade de La Jordanie V-VIII Siecle (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), 181.
Butler, Howard Crosby, and Enno Littmann. Syria: Publications of the Princeton University Archaeological Expeditions to Syria in 1904-1905 and 1909. Vol. 2:A. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1919.
De Vries, Bert. “The Umm El-Jimal Project, 1972-1977.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, no. 244 (1981): 53–72. https://doi.org/10.2307/1356471.
Michel, Anne. Les Eglises d’Epoque Byzantine et Umayyade de La Jordanie V-VIII Siecle. Turnhout: Brepols, 2001.
Characteristics
- Inscribed chancel (not apsidal) with rooms on both sides
- Π-shaped chancel
- None identified
- Not identified
- Single entrance on both north and south sides
- No West entrances
- Chapel is an annex to the barracks
- None
Constantinopolitan
- Protruding apse
- Entrances from the east on either side of the apse
- Π-shaped chancel
- Multiple entrances on all sides
- Ambo on the south
- Exterior chapel to the north
Syrian
- Π-shaped chancel
- Inscribed mono-apsidal
- Rooms on both sides of the apse
- West entrance
- Ambo on south
- Baptistry in room south of the apse or in the south aisle
- Separate south chapel
- South entrances from side rooms/chapels
Roman
- Τ-shaped or bar-shaped chancel
- Tri-apsidal usually inscribed
- Altars in the side apses
- Relics and Reliquaries
- Ambo to the north
- Baptistry outside off the atrium or the north aisle
- Marble furnishings (high status imperial association) and imported fine wares
- Decorative elements on chancel screens [specify]
- Separate north chapel
Syrian to Roman conversion
- Τ-shaped or bar-shaped chancel replacing Π-shaped chancel
- Side apses inserted into rooms adjacent to the main apse
- Separate north chapel (suppressed south chapel)
- Liturgical furniture with decorative motifs like those at St. Clemente in Rome
Classification
Syrian
- Π-shaped chancel
- Inscribed
mono-apsidalrectangular chancel - Rooms on both sides of the
apsechancel -
West entrance Ambo on southBaptistry in room south of the apse or in the south aisleSeparate south chapelSouth entrances from side rooms/chapels
The Archaeology of Liturgy Project reflects research conducted at the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem during 2023.