Patriarch Nektarios of Jerusalem describes a tightly sequenced earthquake episode at the Monastery of St Catherine, with foreshocks at sunset and again at midnight on Monday 30 April, followed by the main shock at dawn on Tuesday 1 May. He writes that “On Monday [AD] 30 April of 1312 at sunset a small earthquake happened, and another one at midnight; at dawn of Tuesday 1 May another great and terrible earthquake occurred,” adding that walls and towers fell, cells collapsed, and monks fled to the cemetery area because the enclosure walls were so damaged that “it was possible for a loaded animal to pass through.”

The correct year for this earthquake is 1212 CE, not 1312 CE. Although Nektarios gives the year as 1312 CE, the weekday–date pairing he reports matches the earthquake described by other authors, such as the contemporary Abu Shama and as-Suyūṭī, in 1212 CE rather than 1312 CE (calculated with CHRONOS).