APAAME
- Reference: APAAME_20191030_PF-0241
- Photographer: Pascal Flohr
- Credit: Aerial Photographic Archive for Archaeology in the Middle East
- Copyright: Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works
Click on Image for high resolution magnifiable image
| Transliterated Name | Language | Name |
|---|---|---|
| Jerash | English | |
| Ǧaraš | Arabic | جرش |
| Gérasa | Greek | Γέρασα |
| Antioch on the Chrysorroas | | |
| Garshu | Semitic/Nabatean |
Jerash has a long history of habitation, flourished during Greco-Roman times, was one of the Decapolis cities, and appears to have suffered a severe drop in population in the 2nd half of the 8th century. It is one of the world's best preserved Greco-Roman cities and has been studied by archaeologists for over a century.
- General Plan of Jerash from Wikipedia
Plan of Jerash. North is to the right.
Wikipedia - Holger Behr
- Ecclesiastical complex at Jerash including the Church of St. Theodore
from Moralee (2006)
Fig. 1
Ecclesiastical complex at Gerasa, adapted from Beat Brenk et al., "Neue Forschungen zur Kathedrale von Gerasa: Probleme der Chronologie und der Vorgângerbauten," ZDPV 112 (1996): 139-55, fig. 1.
Moralee (2006)
The transfer of the capital from Damascus to Baghdad, the growing insecurity of the country, and a series of disastrous earthquakes led ultimately to the desertion of the place. In the nature of the case we cannot say precisely when this happened. Fractured stones, tumbled columns and many signs of hastily interrupted activities are evidence of the earthquake shocks. Coins and other datable objects show that there was life here until the middle of the eighth century at least and probably longer. In 1122 A.D. William of Tyre mentions the city as having been long deserted, and though it was then reoccupied for a short time, Yaqut describes it as again deserted in the next century.Kraeling, C. (1938:260)
Church of St. Theodore - AtriumKraeling, C. (1938:282)
The west wall of the atrium was built of very massive stones, many of them dangerously dislocated by earthquake shocks. It ran alongside a small street which formed the western limit of the complex. A triple entrance only approximately in the center of this wall led into an entrance hall which was paved with mosaics, and from this three long steps descended into the open court. The court had porticoes on three sides only, the north, east and south: the columns in the porticoes had Ionic capitals. Some of the columns may have been moved here from the Fountain Court when it was reconstructed.
Churches of St. John the Baptist, St. George and SS Cosmas and DamianusRussell (1985)
2. The atrium. The atrium was rhomboidal in plan, much longer from north to south than from east to west. On the east side there was a colonnade of 14 Corinthian columns on a low stylobate. The columns, many of which were obviously displaced, vary in diameter, and the capitals found in this area are very miscellaneous in character (Plate XLVI, b). The colonnade apparently never reached beyond the central doors in the parecclesia, but the walk was continued as shown in the plan (Plan XX XVII). The walk was paved with red and white mosaics of which little remains; enough is preserved, however, to show that there were different patterns in front of each church. Before the final desertion of Gerasa the atrium and colonnade, like those in St. Theodore’s and St. Peter’s, were occupied by squatters who built walls in front of and between the columns; the pottery, glass and bronze articles found in their rooms suggest that the place was finally abandoned in haste, possibly after the earthquake in 746 A. D. This occupation explains the disappearance of the steps leading into the churches and the condition of the atrium mosaics
At Jerash, this earthquake apparently brought an end to the impoverished "squatter" occupation in the Church of St. Theodore (Crowfoot 1929: 25. 1938: 221) and parts of the churches of St. John the Baptist. St. George, and SS. Cosmas and Damianus (Crowfoot 1938: 242, 244).Walmsley(2013:86-87) described seismic destruction in Jerash in the mid 8th century CE.
Its many churches continued in use right through the Umayyad period, only to be suddenly destroyed in the mid-eighth century by a violent act of nature — an earthquake — as graphically revealed during the excavation of the Church of St Theodore by the Yale Joint Mission in the 1930s (Crowfoot 1938: 223-4). The severity of this seismic event was recently confirmed by the discovery of a human victim entombed in a collapsed building along with his mule, some possessions and a hoard of 143 silver dirhams of mostly eastern origin, the last of which was minted in the year of the earthquake.As Walmsley(2013:86-87) did not cite a source for the human victim and mule found inside a collapsed building, it is not known if this occurred in the Church of Saint Theodore.