The Cult of Saints in Late Antiquity

As of 2014, this mosaic inscription was still unpublished. It was found in the narthex of a presumably monastic church (usually termed the 'church of the martyr') discovered on the western peak of Tell Iztabba, within the city walls of Scythopolis, close to the Samaritan synagogue. Gabi Mazor, the principal excavator of the site, writes that the inscription, laid out in seven lines, is framed by a medallion, and mentions 'a martyr whose name has either not survived or perhaps there was no need to note it.'

The church was a large trifoliate basilica (with three apses; narthex: 11 m x 23 m; nave: 9 m x 15 m; aisles: 5.5 m x 20 m). A one-aisled chapel (7.8 m x 15 m) with an apse was annexed to the north aisle. Fragments of a reliquary, and marble-lined sunken squares, presumably reliquary pits, were found in the front sector of the central apse, and beneath the site of the altar. The north apse housed a 'decorated coffin [sarcophagus] made of marble', containing skeletal remains. The floor-mosaics were richly ornamented with geometric motifs and images of birds, fruits, and plants.

It is believed that the church was built in the mid-6th c. and superseded an earlier structure, located in a monastic complex just outside the city walls, c. 15 m to the northeast (the so-called 'old church' or 'church of the metropolitan Andreas', named after a bishop mentioned in one of its inscriptions), which had been burnt, apparently in a violent incident. Mazor suggests that the 'old church' could have been the shrine of Basileios, martyr of Scythopolis, mentioned by Cyril of Scythopolis in the Life of Euthymios (E06468), and probably identical with the 'church of the martyr Basilius' visited by the pilgrim Theodosius after 518, and described by him in his De situ Terrae Sanctae (E07913, §115).

The 'old church' must have been built in the late 4th c. Its destruction has been attributed to the Samaritans, based on Leah Di Segni's supposition that the massacre of Christian children described by John Malalas as taking place in a church of St. Basileios at Caesarea Maritima (EXXXXX), at the outbreak of their 529 revolt, actually happened in Scythopolis (see Di Segni 1988 and Mazor 2010, 287). If so, the new church could have been erected from funds granted by the emperor Justinian to cities which suffered in the revolt, and was perhaps relocated into the area protected by the city walls for security reasons. It is then supposed that the cult of Basileios resumed in the new shrine; and, therefore, Mazor supposes that the anonymous martyr of the mosaic inscription is Basileios, a figure so well known in the city that his name did not need to be stated.

To identify all the shrines of Scythopolis mentioned by Cyril with archaeological sites is tempting, but in our case it is a vague mention of an unnamed martyr, and a supposition that Malalas (or his copyists) made a serious topographical error, which are the main reasons behind the identification of the 'church of the martyr' with that of Basileios. The theory is not impossible, but needs to be treated with caution.

Cult building - independent (church)
Cult building - monastic
Altar

Construction of cult buildings

Ecclesiastics - bishops

Bibliography

Images

Plan of the city. From: Tsafrir & Foerster 1997.

North aisle with the sarcophagus. From: Mazor & Bar-Nathan 1998, 3.

Plan of the church. From: Mazor & Bar-Nathan 1998, 30, fig. 35.