Syrian Monastery (Deir al-Suryan)
A Wadi Natrun monastery once home to Syrian monks, with medieval wall paintings revealed by restoration and a legendary library.
A monastery of the Syrians
The Syrian Monastery, Deir al-Suryan, stands a few hundred metres from the Monastery of St Bishoy in Wadi el-Natrun. It was founded in the sixth century as a dependency of St Bishoy, and in the eighth or ninth century it was acquired by monks from Syria and Mesopotamia, who gave it its name. For several centuries it was a meeting point between the Coptic and Syriac traditions of Christianity, and its monks assembled a celebrated library of manuscripts in Syriac, Coptic, Arabic and other languages. In the nineteenth century, many of these manuscripts were acquired by European collectors, and most are now in the British Library, where they form one of the world's most important collections of early Syriac texts.
The Church of the Virgin
The main church, the Church of the Virgin, contains remarkable wall paintings from the medieval period, including scenes of the Annunciation, the Nativity, the Dormition of the Virgin and the Ascension, together with figures of saints and monks. Many of these paintings were hidden for centuries under later layers of plaster; since the 1990s, a conservation project carried out with Dutch and Egyptian specialists has uncovered and conserved them, revealing several phases of painting. The church also preserves carved and inlaid wooden doors, among the finest in Egypt, from the tenth century.
The monastery today
The Syrian Monastery is an active Coptic monastery with a large community of monks. Within its walls are several churches, a keep and a garden with an ancient tamarind tree said to have grown from the staff of St Ephrem the Syrian.
Exhibo editorial
Of all the Wadi Natrun monasteries, this is the one for anyone who loves art. In the dim Church of the Virgin, painted figures of angels, apostles and saints look out from walls where they were hidden under plaster for centuries, their colours newly revealed; the carved wooden doors are as fine as anything in Cairo's museums.
Ask the monks about the library and the story of the manuscripts that ended up in London, and look for the old tamarind tree in the garden. It's a short walk from Anba Bishoy, and the two make a perfect pair.
Gallery
How to find it
The Syrian Monastery lies a few hundred metres north-west of the Monastery of St Bishoy in Wadi el-Natrun, reached from the Wadi el-Natrun exit of the Cairo–Alexandria Desert Road. A monk usually guides visitors to the Church of the Virgin.
