Sinai Peninsula, Egypt
Mount Sinai
What is there today
The monastery of Saint Catherine has been inhabited without interruption since the sixth century, which makes it the oldest working Christian monastery. Inside it holds the largest collection of ancient icons in the world and a library second only to the Vatican. You reach it by road from Sharm el Sheikh, and the mountain is climbed at night to be at the top for dawn.
Why this image comes from here
When the Byzantine empire decided to destroy images in the eighth century, Sinai lay beyond its reach because it was already Muslim territory. That is why what was lost everywhere else survived there, and why the Pantocrator model copied across Christendom today is the one saved in the desert.
Pieces from this place
- Christ Pantocrator
- The oldest surviving Pantocrator has been at the monastery of Saint Catherine, at the foot of Sinai, for fourteen hundred years. It survived the war on images because it was too far away for anyone to reach it.