ABSTRACT
The Sinai Peninsula, a bleak and barren wilderness jutting into the northern end of the Red Sea, acted like a magnet from Early Christian times, attracting to its solitude men and women earnestly engaged in the struggle to save their eternal souls. In the second half of the sixth century, when the Byzantine Empire reached its greatest extent, Justinian I ordered to be constructed, near the foot of Mt. Sinai and on the traditional site of the burning bush, one of his great and lasting monuments, the monastery of St. Catherine, originally intended to double as a fortress at this strategic point in the region. Over the course of its long history die spiritual foundation, in addition to housing an active community of religious men, became a rich repository for works of Christian art, principally in the form of icons, books, and sacred vessels.
