ABSTRACT
When we, in our previous discussion, briefly retrospected the presence of Syriac Christians among the coastal cities of Palestine, where trade preoccupations were possible, we briefly referred to Barhebraeus’ Ethicon, arguing that this text certifies the continuity of a standardised phenomenon of pilgrimage to Palestine beyond any temporal social and political changes in the medieval Middle Eastern area. In this chapter, we will extend our analysis of two historical texts closely that interferes with the theme of travelling to the Holy City: on one hand, we will discuss the first mēmrā of Barhebraeus’ Ethicon (where the author describes the pilgrimage to Jerusalem in Chapter 9); and on the other, we will evaluate a case of a pilgrimage with a much larger geographical trajectory: from China towards Jerusalem. This brings to the scene two East Syriac monks, Sauma and Marqos (the later Patriarch Yahballāhā III), originally from China, who had the initiative of a pilgrimage from Beijing to Jerusalem and embark on this project but never achieved the ultimate goal. The chapter will end with references to the monastic emblem of the Syriac Orthodox in the Holy City in late Middle Ages, St Mark Monastery, which exists until today. Illustrating the tradition of this monastery we will also inspect the standardised Syriac pilgrimage to the Holy City until the Ottoman period with a synthesis of some colophons, notes, and inscriptions testifying this ongoing phenomenon above this limited period.
