Zuqnin Monastery was an ancient Christian monastery located just to the north of Amida, near the modern-day city of

Diyarbakır Diyarbakır (; ; ; ) is the largest Kurdish-majority city in Turkey. It is the administrative center of Diyarbakır Province. Situated around a high plateau by the banks of the Tigris river on which stands the historic Diyarbakır Fortress, ...

in eastern Turkey.

John of Ephesus John of Ephesus (or of Asia) ( Greek: Ίωάννης ό Έφέσιος, c. 507 – c. 588) was a leader of the early Syriac Orthodox Church in the sixth century and one of the earliest and the most important historians to write in Syriac. John o ...

was ordained here by

John of Tella John of Tella (or John Bar Qursos) (483–538) was a monk and bishop in the Near East. John was a major proponent of moderate Miaphysitism. Although his native language was Syriac he studied Greek in order to serve in the Byzantine administration. ...

in 529. It is at this monastery that the '' Zuqnin Chronicle'' was written by a West Syrian monk, probably Joshua the Stylite, in around 775, of which the monastery is most associated with. The library of the monastery was of considerable renown to scholars in the area, containing many valuable books, including the works of

Eusebius Eusebius of Caesarea (; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος ; 260/265 – 30 May 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilus (from the grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος τοῦ Παμφίλου), was a Greek historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christ ...

Socrates Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...

, John of Ephesus and the Chronicle of Zuqnin.

References

History of Diyarbakır Province Ancient libraries Syriac Orthodox monasteries in Turkey {{Turkey-struct-stub