Saint Catherine's Monastery

An Eastern Orthodox monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai in Egypt, founded in the sixth century and dedicated to Saint Catherine of Alexandria.

Justinian I: Byzantine emperor from 527 to 565 who expanded imperial authority and sponsored major building projects. Tradition associates the monastery’s fortified church and enclosure with his reign.
Eastern Orthodox Church: A communion of churches sharing Orthodox theology, liturgy, and episcopal tradition. The monastery belongs to the Orthodox tradition and follows its worship.
Codex Sinaiticus: A fourth-century Greek manuscript of the Christian Bible, now divided among several collections. It was discovered at the monastery by Constantin von Tischendorf in the nineteenth century.
UNESCO World Heritage Site: A cultural or natural property inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List for its recognized value. The monastery forms part of the World Heritage property called Saint Catherine Area.
Mount Sinai: A mountain in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula traditionally identified with the biblical revelation to Moses. The monastery’s location derives its significance from this sacred landscape.
Christian monasticism: A Christian way of life organized around prayer, discipline, and communal or solitary withdrawal. Monastic practice structures the community’s daily life.
Sinai icons: A group of early Christian panel paintings preserved at Saint Catherine’s Monastery. Their survival makes the monastery a major source for early icon painting.
Sinai palimpsests project: A research project using imaging and digital methods to recover erased writing in Sinai manuscripts. It has revealed undertexts in manuscripts held by the monastery’s library.
Saint Catherine of Alexandria: A Christian martyr venerated in tradition as a learned woman executed at Alexandria. The monastery is dedicated to her, and her relics are venerated there.
Greek Orthodox Church of Sinai: An autonomous Orthodox church whose archbishop is the abbot of Saint Catherine’s Monastery. It is the monastery’s ecclesiastical body and governing institution.

Linked from 3 pages