The Jordan Times gives us an update — actually a downdate — on the excavation of the ancient church of St. Georgeous, which some archeologists were placing in the apostolic era.

AMMAN – The government on Wednesday rejected as baseless rumours it intends to permanently close down two key Christian sites in the eastern town of Rihab.

Community leaders in the town have been threatening to step up a protest they started after the archaeologist who discovered what is said to be the oldest cave church in the world was removed from his post as director of the former Rihab Archaeological and Research Centre, which is now called the Rihab Archaeological Project.

The discovery, albeit controversial, attracted world attention after it was first reported by The Jordan Times in June, with international media outlets sending teams to examine the site.

The cave church lies under a 3rd century church and is said to have been a hidden worshipping place for early Christians who fled persecution at the hands of Romans.

Local community members in Rihab have expressed high hopes that the new discovery, which pushed their small town to the spotlight for some time, would yield fruit in the form of an influx of religious tourists, especially since around 30 old churches have been unearthed in the area.

Residents expressed rejection of what they perceived as ministry orders to bury the cave and close down the site in the face of tourists, but Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Maha Khatib told The Jordan Times in a telephone interview that her ministry is working on a site management plan for both churches to be implemented “soon”.

“Visitors need services such as a rest place, tour guides and an information centre, among other facilities,” the minister said.

Rihab Mayor Khaled Akho Rsheida quoted archaeology officials in Rihab as telling him they had received “verbal” orders from Antiquities Department Director General Fawwaz Khreisha to “conceal the sites, take down the signs and prevent tourists from visiting the location”.

An official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed that already a US group of journalists, who arrived at the site were prevented from touring St. Georgeous Church, which was discovered three years ago, and the cave church beneath.

“This is not only a treasure for Rihab, but for the Kingdom,” the mayor said.

MP Ibrahim Mohammad Omoush, who represents the area’s electoral district, said both the former director of the Rihab centre, Abdul Qader Al Housan, and his successor, Jameel Masaeed, confirmed receiving instructions to “bar visitors from touring the sites, to take down the signs and bury the [cave] church completely”.

“But the ministry denied all this,” the lawmaker told The Jordan Times.

Another deputy representing Mafraq, Tayseer Shdeifat, said that closing down the church in Rihab would be a “crime against our cultural legacy”.

Khreisha expressed “shock” over these “nonsensical claims”.

“The ministry just wants to unify the size, colour and shapes of all signs in archaeological sites all over the Kingdom.”

Khreisha added that the ministry is “simply seeking to preserve the site” by following a routine procedure usually taken in the winter to cover the mosaic floors of all open sites with nylon covered with sand to absorb rainwater and prevent humidity from developing that may destroy the mosaic. He denied there were any instructions to bury the cave for good.

“We at the ministry have plans to restore the mosaics in the group of churches unearthed in the area and to publish brochures and booklets concerning the churches discovered.”

Khreisha said that the ministry will initiate its plan in 2009.

Jameel Masaeed, the new Rihab Archaeological Project director, said he is unaware of any future ministry plans regarding the sites. He declined to comment further.

But apparently the measures taken by the Antiquities Department halted another plan that was in the making.

Archimandrite Nektarious, bishop deputy of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, told The Jordan Times that the Orthodox Archdiocese had already obtained the approval from the Antiquities Department to start a project to protect and restore St. Georgeous Church and to provide it with the needed infrastructure “to make any visitor’s stopover a pure delight”.

He said that funds were already secured and preparations under way, but they had to stop everything when the department closed the sites.

Nektarious added that leaders of the Orthodox church were the very first to visit the site of St. Georgous when excavations of the church were under way in early 2005, when they held a mass and decided to support the site, believed to be the first church in the world.

Another visitor to the site, Mohammad Abu Dalbouh, said that the site is popular in the Greek Orthodox community in Russia after the visit of the Russian ambassador along with a group from the embassy in 2006. Abu Dalbouh, an agricultural engineer and a graduate of a Russian university, said he was planning to promote the site among his acquaintances in Russia, adding that all Christians in the world should be targeted by promotion campaigns.

Reverend George Abu Ghazaleh, who visited Rihab churches with his family during the summer, said: “I am interested in any discoveries related to the Bible.”

According to his biblical and archaeological knowledge, “there are several indicators to the authenticity of these churches”, referring to the inscription on the stone of the first church and the coins found in the cave, but said “more in-depth studies and research” should be done…

Giddy up! The AP reports on a patristic-era find in Syria. They say it’s the largest so far discovered in Palmyra.

Archaeologists in central Syria have unearthed the remnants of an 8th century church, an antiquities official said Thursday.

A Syrian-Polish archaeological team recently discovered the church in the ancient city of Palmyra, said Walid al-Assaad, the head of the Palmyra Antiquities and Museums Department. He did not say specifically when the church was discovered or the exact date the church was built.

He said the church is the fourth and largest discovered so far in Palmyra — an ancient trade center that is now an archaeological treasure trove.

The church’s base measures 51-by-30 yards, and archaeologists estimate its columns stood 20 feet tall and its wooden ceiling would have been about 50 feet high, al-Assaad said.

A small amphitheater also was found in the church’s courtyard where experts believe Christian rituals were practiced, al-Assaad said.

“In the northern and southern parts of the church there are two rooms that are believed to have been used for baptisms, religious ceremonies, prayers and other rituals,” he said.

Ancient Palmyra, located some 150 miles northeast of Damascus, was the center of an Arab servant state to the Roman empire and thrived on caravan trades across the desert to Mesopotamia and Persia.

Under the 3rd century Syrian Queen Zenobia, the city rebelled against Roman rule and briefly carved out an independent desert Arab kingdom before being reconquered and razed by the Romans.

Somebody lost an earring in Jerusalem in the fifth century — gold, pearl, and emeralds — and it’s gorgeous. Check the lost and found.

In one of our commboxes, Maureen pointed to a very cool site dedicated to the church unearthed in the plain of Megiddo a few years ago. It seems to be still under construction, but what’s up already is wonderful.

Ancient Christian gravesites found in Ephesus:

The Ephesus excavations representative of the Culture and Tourism Ministry, Dr. Soner Ateşoğulları, also said … the tomb reflected the development level of the era in terms of architecture and jewelry and that it was an important part of culture history, Ateşoğulları said they concluded that the older skeletons were Pagan while the subsequent ones were Christian.

You can tell by the skeleton.

A group of archaeologists are trying to establish if Norsemen brought Christianity to Caithness before St. Columba arrived on Iona.

A team of Bulgarian archaeologists discovered mosaics from Byzantine times in a house destroyed in Attila’s raids.

While I was in Washington last week, the archeologists were digging overtime.

Turkish Daily News says: “Church Discovered In Orhaneli One Of World’s Earliest.” (They mean “the first church constructed after the Roman Empire adopted Christianity,” so fourth century.)

The University of British Columbia tells of a site in Sicily that yielded “a tomb, skeletons and burial rites with both Christian and pagan elements.” Specifically:

A hole in the stone slab covering the tomb allowed visitors to pour libations for the dead.

“This shows that the long-established, originally pagan, rite of offering libations to the dead clearly continued into early Byzantine times,” observes Wilson.

Yet, the presence of a Christian cross on a lamp found in the room and on the underside of a grave slab suggests that the deceased were Christian. As well, the skeletons were wrapped in plaster, a practice believed to be Christian for preserving the body for resurrection.

“It is the first plaster burial recorded in Sicily, although the practice is known from Christian communities in North Africa,” says Wilson.

Smithsonian reports on the “rediscovery” of a patristic-era monastery in Iraq.

In Iraq, a Monastery Rediscovered
Near Mosul, War Has Helped and Hindered Efforts to Excavate the 1,400-Year-Old Dair Mar Elia Monastery

By James Foley

A soldier scaled the fragile wall of the monastery and struck a pose. His buddies kept shouting up to him to move over some.

He shifted to the left and stood the stadia rod straight to register his position for the survey laser on the tripod below.

The 94th Corps of Engineers of Fort Leonard Wood, whose members normally sprint to their data points in full body armor and Kevlar helmets, are making a topographical map of the ancient Assyrian monastery that until recently had been occupied by the Iraqi Republican Guard and then by the 101st Airborne Division in the once verdant river valley near Mosul.

The Dair Mar Elia Monastery is finally getting some of the expert attention that the 1,400-year-old sacred structure deserves.

Read more…