Church/Monastery name:
Ḥorvat Kenes - Northern Church
Inscription number:
5
Inscription type:
invocation/prayer
Location:
In the mosaic pavement of the northern portico of the atrium.
Physical description :
Broken mosaic medallion.
Text:
τõν ἁγί⟨ω⟩ν σοῦ
καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου
Κόνωνος,
ἀμήν. ☩
Summary:
Invocation of St. Conon in a broken medallion, in the mosaic pavement of the northern portico of the atrium.
Considering that about half of the medallion enclosing the inscription is lost, i.e., probably four lines of corresponding length to those that are preserved, more than one restoration of the text can be suggested. Most likely the missing part of the text contained an invocation to God, or more probably to Christ, to remember/have/mercy/succour one or more of the donors, or to give rest to a deceased relative of his. An invocation of behalf of the whole community can also be considered. If the invocation was on behalf of a specific person or persons, it is impossible to restore the text. If, on the other hand, it was on behalf of the community, the following tentative restoration can be suggested, as giving the right number of letters in the four lines we suppose lost:
[Κ(ύρι)ε Ἰ(ησο)ῦ Χ(ριστο)ς]
[ἐλέησον]
[τὴν κώμην εὐ-]
[χαῖς πάντων]
τõν ἁγί⟨ω⟩ν σοῦ
καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου
Κόνωνος,
ἀμήν.
[Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy upon this village, by the prayers of all] your saints and of Saint Conon, amen.
The inscription provides the name of the patron saint of the church, St. Conon (probably the martyr of Iconium). There is no church of this title that I know of in Palestine, but a monastery of St. Conon at Zoraoua (Ezra‘) is mentioned in the Epistle of the Archimandrites of Arabia (569/70 CE).
For this and similar formulas, invoking the intercession of saints and/or a specific saint, see for instance G.M. FitzGerald, A Sixth-Century Monastery at Beth Shan (Scythopolis), Philadelphia 1939, pp. 13–14, nos. I–III; SEG XXXII: 1520–1521 (from Bahan and Kh. Buraq in Samaria); G.E. Kirk and C.B. Welles, The Inscriptions, in H.D. Colt ed. Excavations at Nessana I. London 1962, p. 156, no. 52.