A Church Dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the Temple of Isis at Aswan?
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ECA 7 (2010), p. 1-16; doi: 10.2143 / ECA.7.0.2136901 A Church Dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the Temple of Isis at Aswan? Jitse H.F. DIJKSTRA and Gertrud J.M. VAN LOON INTRODUCTION The resulting publication, which appeared in 1978, contains in the first place an edition of the hiero- Ancient Syene is almost completely covered by the glyphic reliefs of the temple and the decorated southern part of modern Aswan (‘Old Aswan’), blocks of other buildings found in the surrounding which makes archaeological excavation of the site area that were dumped here.5 But the Italian team difficult1. As a result, only two ancient monuments also published several textual and figural graffiti have been preserved, the temple of Domitian and from the temple’s walls, and a useful map of the the temple of Isis. In the 1980s and 1990s success- building (which served as the basis for Fig. 2)6. ful surveys in the area around the Isis temple led to The temple as it stands today actually consists only the creation, in the year 2000, of a joint project of of its nucleus (the naos), that is, of three chapels for the Swiss Institute of Architectural and Archaeo- cult statues (Fig. 2, nos H, F, J) with a small hall logical Research on Ancient Egypt and the Supreme in front of it (the pillared hall, D) containing two Council of Antiquities. This project, under super- square pillars (PI and PII)7. vision of Cornelius von Pilgrim, the director of the A first inventory in 2001 by the first author of Swiss Institute, constitutes the first systematic exca- this article revealed that the publication of the vations ever to take place in Aswan. Apart from graffiti by the Italian team was far from exhaustive. excavating the small plots of land surrounding the As a result, a separate project was started, the Isis temples of Isis and Domitian (Fig. 1, Areas 1 and 3), Temple Graffiti Project, that was aimed at publish- several emergency excavations have been conducted ing all graffiti (352 in total, both figures and texts) whenever the occasion arose after building activities from the temple8. From the study of the graffiti it in this densely populated part of Aswan had revealed ancient remains. Thus far, no less than 65 sites have been explored and three preliminary 1 We would like to thank Sabrina Higgins and Justin Kroesen reports covering the first six seasons (2000-2006) for comments on an earlier version of this article. have been published2. 2 Von Pilgrim et al. 2004, 2006, and 2008. For the surveys, In the first four seasons the activities of the see Jaritz/Rodziewicz 1994 and Jaritz/Rodziewicz 1996. 3 Swiss-Egyptian mission concentrated in large part Bruhn in Von Pilgrim et al. 2004, 127-134; Bruhn in Von Pilgrim et al. 2006, 238-251, 272-277. on the excavation of the mudbrick houses dating 4 Mariette/Maspero 1889, 6 (Pls 22-26); de Morgan et al. to the first to eleventh centuries CE around the 1894, 47-57. temple of Isis (Fig. 1, Area 1)3. The excavations 5 Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978. 6 revived an interest in this temple, which lies buried Hieroglyphic-demotic graffiti: Bresciani in Bresciani/Perni- gotti 1978, 124-143 (nos 1-43). Greek graffiti: Foraboschi deep in the middle of the ancient houses (Pl. 1). in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 144-145 (nos 1-2; a third, The temple of Isis, a small but completely pre- undecipherable text did not receive a number). Coptic served Ptolemaic temple, was discovered in 1871 graffiti: Pernigotti in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 146 by engineers working on a railroad from Aswan to (nos 1-8). Figural graffiti: Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 34-39. Map: Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, Pl. VI. Shellal (on the east bank of the Nile at Philae). Fol- 7 Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 17. lowing its discovery, some plans and copies of 8 Dijkstra, in press. This study will contain a detailed reliefs were published at the end of the nineteenth description and documentation (in the form of a drawing century4, but nothing much happened until an or photograph) of each graffito, as well as introductions to the different groups of graffiti, and a general introduction Italian team under supervision of Edda Bresciani that will place this (in large part) new body of material in started work on the temple a century later, in 1971. a wider context. 1 94164_ECA7_2010_01.indd 1 28/11/11 14:26 Fig. 1. Topographical map with areas investigated during the first six campaigns of the Swiss-Egyptian mission (Von Pilgrim et al. 2008, Fig. 1) 2 94164_ECA7_2010_01.indd 2 28/11/11 14:26 Pl. 1. The temple of Isis at Aswan (© G.J.M. van Loon, February 2010) Fig. 2. Key map to the temple of Isis at Aswan with a tentative reconstruction of (parts of ) the church (Von Pilgrim et al. 2006, Fig. 7) 3 94164_ECA7_2010_01.indd 3 28/11/11 14:26 soon became clear that they had much to tell about Despite this detailed study, two issues regarding the architectural history of the building, especially the church have thus far remained open: When was its reuse as a church in Christian times. The Italian the temple dedicated as a church? And to whom team had already found traces of the reuse of the was it dedicated? Both questions have been temple as a church, such as Christian graffiti, addressed by Bresciani on the basis of the Christian hacked away reliefs, certain adaptations in the pave- wall paintings the Italian team discovered. She dated ment, wall niches and, especially, two Christian the paintings to the sixth century CE and identified wall paintings on the opposite faces of the northern an enthroned figure on the northern pillar as the and southern pillars (PI-II)9. On the basis of these Virgin Mary. Therefore, she thought it ‘highly features they surmised that the church was built in probable’ that the church was dedicated to the the pillared hall and that the altar of the church Virgin12. Since it lies beyond the expertise of the stood in front of the entrance to the main sanctuary former author to properly assess these statements in (E), which was closed off with an apsidal niche10. the light of the ample comparative material now As this reconstruction was only assumed but not available, he asked the latter author to take a closer proven by a systematic study, in 2002-2003 a look at the paintings13. The present article is the meticulous analysis was made of the graffiti and result of our collaborative efforts. In the following other architectural features of the building. In addi- we shall start with a description of the wall paintings. tion to confirming Bresciani’s hypothesis that the We shall then try to interpret the composition. church was located in the pillared hall (D) this The following section discusses the scenes in the study has resulted in a tentative reconstruction of larger setting of the church interior by comparing several essential parts of the church (indicated in it to the decorative programme of contemporary Fig. 2) and the establishment of different phases of church interiors known so far. This discussion will reuse of the building in Late Antiquity and later lead to a reassessment of the date of the wall paint- times11. ings and, as a consequence, of the foundation of the church. In the final section we shall come back to the question whether the church could have been dedicated to the Virgin Mary. We shall argue that both of Bresciani’s statements need to be treated 9 Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 39: ‘Ma certamente with caution. gli elementi più interessanti, archeologicamente, della cris- tianizzazione dell’antico tempio come chiesa cristiana, sone THE WALL PAINTINGS le vestigia di affreschi sulle due facce centrali, contrapposte, dei pilastri della sala (…)’. 10 Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 38-41 (Pls XXVII- The wall paintings were located on the south face XXVIII). Cf. Grossmann 1995, 194, who seems to take of the northern pillar and the north face of the over Bresciani’s hypothesis, yet remarks that the church southern pillar (Fig. 2, nos PI and PII). The earlier was built in ‘das Allerheiligste des Tempels’, that is, the investigators of the temple did not notice the paint- main sanctuary of the temple. 11 ings, which suggests that the traces were probably Dijkstra in Von Pilgrim et al. 2006, 228-238. 14 12 Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 39-41 (Pls XXVII- already very faint from the beginning . When the XXVIII). Quote at p. 41: ‘altamente probabile’. Italian team discovered them in 1971 they had 13 A preliminary version of this paper, focussing on art- become barely visible and for this reason they took historical aspects, was read by the second author on the Fifth International Symposium on Early Christianity and photographs on infrared film. Cristina Guidotti Monasticism: Aswan and Nubia (Aswan, 31 January – then made copies of the originals in situ and, with 5 February 2010), organized by the St. Mark Foundation the help of the infrared photographs, compiled for Coptic History Studies and the St. Shenouda the Archi- drawings that documented everything she could mandrite Coptic Society. 15 14 Cf. Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 41. see : one colour drawing of the south face of the 15 Bresciani in Bresciani/Pernigotti 1978, 39: ‘L’aiuto di una northern pillar and one black-and-white and one serie di foto all’infrarosso, eseguite da F. Gabrielli nel 1971, colour drawing of the north face of the southern è stato assai grande per individuare particolari non chiari pillar16.