Chained in faith: 5th-century female skeleton may be world’s 1st self-mortifying Christian nun
Cutting-edge technology allows a team of Israeli researchers to determine that mysterious ironclad remains found in a church near Jerusalem belonged to a woman
Rossella Tercatin is The Times of Israel's archaeology and religions reporter.
Some 1,600 years ago, a mysterious woman was bound with four heavy metal rings around her neck and others around her arms and legs. Iron plates on her stomach completed what was effectively an armored structure.
When the woman died, she was buried under the altar of a church some three kilometers northwest of Jerusalem’s Old City. Burial under the altar is reserved for only the most honored individuals.
This is how the enigmatic skeleton was found, still wrapped in its eternal tools of torture, by a team of archaeologists of the Israel Antiquities Authority as they were excavating the Khirbat el-Masani’ site ahead of construction work near the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo in 2016-2017.
What is difficult to understand through a modern lens is that this woman likely was the mistress of her own torment: Many historical sources document extreme practices of self-flagellation in the Byzantine period. These practices included not only wearing heavy chains, metal rings, or rocks but also confining themselves in very small and isolated rooms or even cages with no space to move, prolonged fasts, exposing the body to the elements, denying themselves sleep, and jumping in the fire.
Though the sex of the skeleton was initially unknown, experts assumed it was male like the only two other known cases of extreme self-flagellation from the period, which were also uncovered in the Levant. But a new analysis of tooth enamel has overturned that assumption, revealing the remains to be female — and likely a nun, according to the researchers.
The discovery marks the first-ever archaeological evidence of a woman practicing such severe self-discipline rituals, according to a Monday Israel Antiquities Authority announcement.
“We uncovered two wings of a Byzantine monastery, the western part, which included several rooms and a courtyard, and the eastern wing, where the Church stood,” IAA excavation director Zubair Adawi told The Times of Israel in a phone interview. “The church presented three apses. We located the bima [altar] in front of the central one. We are talking about the most important part of the church. Under it, we found three tombs carved in the bedrock. One of them contained the skeleton wrapped in iron rings.”
The finding was unprecedented for the team of Israeli archaeologists.
“As an archaeologist for the Israel Antiquities Authority, I participate in many excavations, but I had never seen anything like it,” Adawi said. “To find something similar, we have to go back to the 1990s, when the skeleton of a chained male monk was uncovered at the site of Khirbet Tabaliya, on the way between Jerusalem and Bethlehem.”
The other tombs under the altar contained the remains of women, men, and children. Based on coins and other artifacts uncovered at the site, archaeologists believe the monastery was in use between the 5th and the 7th centuries CE.
The skeleton bound in iron rings was found in very bad condition. For this reason, it was not immediately possible to determine its sex.
However, researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science were able to isolate specific proteins from the tooth, known as amelogenin proteins, which are encoded by the X and Y sex chromosomes. Weizmann’s Dr. Paula Kotli, David Morgenstern, and Prof. Elisabetta Boaretto managed to extract the proteins from the enamel and, through cutting-edge analysis, established the biological gender of the skeleton.
Regarding the woman’s age, the scientists could only determine that she was most likely older than 30 and younger than 60 years old.
Torturous faith
Historical sources document extreme practices of self-flagellation in the Byzantine period that were engaged in by both sexes.
“Theodoret of Cyrrhus described these practices in his book ‘Historia Religiosa,'” Adawi said, referring to a prominent 5th-century theologian. “He mentioned a few examples of monks wearing iron chains.”
The work names two women, Marana and Cyra, who bound their entire body in chains, including the neck, waist, and limbs, for 42 years.
Two additional women from the Byzantine period, who were recognized as saints by several churches, including the Eastern Orthodox Church, are also venerated for their ascetic practices, Pelagia the Penitent and Marina the Syrian. The former was a prostitute who eventually embraced Christianity; the latter decided to follow her father to a monastery after her mother’s death. Both led a life of self-denial, fasting, and prayer but did so disguised as men, a sign that monastic life was sometimes difficult to access for women, according to IAA experts.
Other sources illuminate the stories of Christian women from the larger Near East who moved to Jerusalem, some even establishing monasteries.
“Self-flagellation practices are well documented in written sources, but archaeological evidence is rare,” Adawi said. “Besides the two examples from the Jerusalem area, only one more chained monk was found in Egypt. Even though we know from historical sources that the custom soon spread to Western Europe, including Italy, France, and England.”
While the mystery around the chained nun’s identity might never be solved, she must have been an important personality within the community, perhaps a venerated figure.
“Only VIPs were buried under the altar of a church,” Adawi said. “Because we also found remains of men, it is unlikely that the monastery was just female and that the woman was the head of the community. Maybe she donated money to the monastery, or played another role.”
Although the research work on the skeleton is concluded, with its results published in a recent academic paper, Adawi said much remains to be explored.
“I believe we need to understand more about the role of women in Christianity during the Byzantine period,” he said.
