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Mar Yakub at Qara, the apostle Mark |
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Research in close cooperation between the Directorate General of Antiquities
and Museums and the German Archaeological Institute in Damascus has been carried out at the site between 1999 and 2001. The work was supported by the Melkite Catholic Bishopric of Homs, Hama and Yabrud; significant assistance was also provided by the nuns of Deir Mar Yakub, under the direction of Agnes-Maria de la Croix. The results of this cooperation were substantial: namely a complete catalogue of the murals, of which only a few fragments in the National Museum in Damascus were known before. The plans and elevations of the monastery were also published for the first time as part of this project.
Prior to the renovation and extension of the monastery in 1994, the monastic complex consisted of a group of buildings constructed according to the local tradition of the Qalamun. Typical of this style are mud brick walls and poplar and juniper stems used as roofing material. The oldest structure is a tower with a reinforced basement, used both as living accommodation and refuge. On typological and architectural grounds, this may be dated as early as the 6th century. The present church cannot have been constructed earlier than the tenth or early eleventh century. The most remarkable characteristic of this undecorated building is its two-storey design, consisting of an upper and lower church. The remaining structures, including the living and working quarters as well as the watermill, are more recent. Most of these date to the 19th century.
The paintings in the lower church, whose entire extent was discovered between 1999 and 2001, consist of two separate layers which are separated chronologically by about two centuries. The conditions for church decoration, however, changed profoundly during this period. The earlier layer, which can be dated to the eleventh century on stylistic grounds, depicts the cycle of Christ. While it is one of the earliest known medieval wall paintings from Syria and the Lebanon, it is unique on a regional level in its iconography and style. The selection of scenes depicted, as well as their chronological sequence parallels frescoes from Cappadocia. The scene of the "Purification in the Temple", however, is so rarely represented that the closest parallels are found in Norman Sicily or the Alpine regions under Lombard control. On a stylistic level, the cycle depicting the Life of Christ can be linked to contemporary frescoes in Cyprus. In this it clearly reflects the trends and developments of art in the Byzantine Empire at the time. Instead of implying relations with Cyprus, however, this Byzantine influence on the art-world must be seen as a reflection of the authority of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch. In the course of the Byzantine Reconquista (969-1084), this Patriarchate evidently claimed Melkite institutions from beyond the Empire as well. For Qara, this development meant that the vacant see was reoccupied, and plans were set in motion to re-establish the monastery.
The second layer of paintings, however, was applied in a very different socio-politic situation. It includes the so-called 'Museum Fragmens', which were removed by employees of the Syrian Antiquities' Organisation during a rescue campaign in 1970. They were subsequently brought to the museums at Damascus and Deir Atiye and have only been returned to the monastery recently. In the course of the project, it could be identified that their original position was in the apse of the lower church, which has a frieze-like decoration reproducing a 'Great Deisis', consisting of angels, prophets and apostles, in the upper zone. Originally, there would have been a row of twelve fully represented bishops as representatives of the Orthodox Church below this. Other remnants of the second layer include 'Moses receiving the Law' on the triumphal arch and, finally, a fragment of an equestrian saint. Despite severe damage, it appears possible to reconstruct this programme, which plays a central role in any discussion of the so-called 'Syrian style'.
Together with the Wadi Qadisha in the hinterland of Byblos und Tripoli, the Qalamun area forms a region in which the paintings of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were marked by a local style.
The workshop that created the Deir Mar Yakub frescoes may well also have decorated the nearby Church of Saint Sergius. At Deir Mar Musa near Nebek (1192/93 or 1208) the painter Sarkis had signed the third layer of frescoes shortly before. The common features, which, in spite of several differences, are predominant in the Syrian Orthodox Deir Mar Musa, as well as in Melkite Qara, may indicate that the 'Syrian Style' was not related to any specific confession. Furthermore, it could underline that the medium of wall painting was not used to express theological differences.
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