Al-Qusur: Christian remains on Failaka By Chaitali B. Roy
Christianity as a faith is not new to the Arabian Gulf. Both Kuwait and Bahrain have a small community of indigenous Christians who are integral to the fabric of their nations. The history of Christianity in Kuwait is closely linked to the island of Failaka, which has one of the earliest Christian sites at al-Qusur. “Al-Qusur is very important to our understanding of Christianity in the early Islamic period. It is hoped that archaeological remains from this site will help throw light on an issue that has been the subject of much debate – namely the presence of Christianity in the region, and the time frame in which it existed,” said Julie Bonnéric, co-director of the French-Kuwaiti Archaeological Mission, who has been studying the site in Failaka for more than a decade. Dr Bonnéric made this remark during her presentation titled ‘The French-Kuwaiti Archaeological Mission in Failaka Island: A Focus on the Al-Qusur Monastery’ at the French Residence recently. A researcher at the Annemarie-Schimmel College, University of Bonn, Dr Bonneric has been in charge of the al-Qusur site since 2011, and with her team has been excavating, mapping, and studying objects that will increase our understanding of Christianity in Failaka in particular and Kuwait and the Arabian Gulf in general. An archaeologist, pottery specialist, Dr Bonnéric holds a PhD in Islamic and Medieval History from EPHE-Sorbonne (Paris).
Isolation
The island of Failaka has more than 4,000 years of history in 16 square miles. According to Andrew Lawler, a contributing editor for ‘Archaeology’, “The secret to Failaka’s rich past is its location, just 60 miles south of the spot where the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers empty into the Gulf. From the rise of Ur, the world’s largest metropolis in the late third millennium BC, until Saddam Hussein’s attack during the First Gulf War, the island has been a strategic prize. The island’s relative isolation provided a safe haven for Christian mystics and farmers amid the rise of Islam in seventh and eighth century AD, as well as for pirates a millennium later.” The hidden depths of Failaka has aroused the interest of archaeologists around the world resulting in fieldwork being carried out from the seventies onwards by international teams from Italy, France, Poland and Slovakia who have worked with their Kuwaiti counterparts to unearth the history of the island, and in turn the region.
Tracing the beginning of Christianity in the Arabian Peninsula, K. De Langhe in an article titled ‘Early Christianity in Iraq and the Gulf’ writes, ‘Christianity probably entered the Arabian Peninsula from Iraq and Syria. From here it spread throughout the whole of the near East, and later on also along the Arabian Gulf. It was spread in a peaceful manner by priests and monks who had fled from the Sassanian heartlands due to persecutions from the early Sassanian rulers.”
The site of al-Qusur in the middle of Failaka was home to a settlement dating from late Pre-Islamic to Early Islamic period, said Dr Bonnéric. “According to written sources, the presence of Christianity in the Gulf dates from the end of the 4th Century to the 7th Century whereas archaeological remains testify to the presence of Christian communities in the Gulf in the first two centuries after the birth of Islam. Some settlements continued until the 9th Century CE.” The study of al-Qusur and similar sites like Kharg (Iran) and Sir Bani Yas (UAE) help us to understand not only the history of Christianity in the Gulf, but also the relationship between Muslims and Christians after the advent of Islam, and the later disappearance of Christianity.
Dr Bonnéric remarked that scarcity of written material and silence in the Arabic sources about Christianity in the region makes it difficult to unfold the pages of history. The mention of Christianity, on the other hand, in Syriac texts, which notes the presence of bishops and monasteries in the Gulf, affirms the presence of several Christian communities in the region as early as the fourth century. A recent discovery of coins with Syriac inscriptions at al-Qusur has aroused excitement in academic circles. “We know that the community settled in al-Qusur was Christian, but we do not know if they were Syriac or Nestorian in origin. It could be that the community spoke Syriac, but perhaps they were imported from elsewhere, or it could be that the coins travelled to al-Qusur from a Syriac speaking region,” pondered the scholar who is awaiting the results of epigraphic interpretation.
Dr Bonnéric also discussed the different kinds of material discoveries that have been made in al-Qusur in terms of pottery, ceramic, mud brick buildings, stone engravings, stucco mouldings, courtyard houses with their work areas, and mudbrick walls. Speaking of archaeological remains at al-Qusur, Dr Bonnéric remarked, “What is interesting is that a lot of the archeological remain is on the surface which gives us a lot of information even without excavation.”
Al-Qusur was first excavated in the mid-1970s by an Italian team. In 1989, the French archaeological mission working in al-Qusur excavated a monastery with a church surrounded by a densely settled area. “One of the debates about Christianity in the region is whether its presence was before or after Islam, and the site at al-Qusur offers an answer to this question.
The settlement at al-Qusur is organized around two well-preserved churches. The work of the French-Kuwaiti Archaeological Mission has revealed that the monastery at this site was probably built at the end of the Sassanian period (6th or 7th Century), and it continued to be occupied until the 9th Century. So in al-Qusur, there is an indication of Christian presence both before and after Islam. ”Apart from al-Qusur, four other churches have been discovered in the Arabian Gulf – Akkaz in Kuwait, Al-Kharg in Iran, Sir Bani Yas in Abu Dhabi and Jubayl in Saudi Arabia. “The church in al-Qusur is one of the largest,” Dr Bonneric affirmed. Interestingly, four of the Christian settlements in the Gulf are on islands. “It may have been a community involved in missionary activity to India and China, and it made sense for them to stop on the islands on their way from Mesopotamia or Syria,” mused Dr Bonneric, “but it was not a small monastery where travellers stopped for a break, it was an important community.”
Questions
Several questions remain unanswered at al-Qusur. “Why did the community disappear? Was it a general phenomenon?” asks Dr Bonnéric. “Was the courtyard building home to the monks or to villagers who lived in that settlement? Was the mud brick wall an enclosure for the monks living quarters or was the site a dispersed monastery? Was the church Nestorian in liturgy? Many such questions abound, and sure answers are awaited. The presence of Christianity in the Arabian Gulf has provoked an abiding interest in scholars and historians for many years.
In an article titled, ‘Christianity in the Arab-Persian Gulf’, Dr Julie Bonnéric notes, “Christians have a long and ancient history in the Arab-Persian Gulf, probably from the end of the 4th Century until at least the 9th. The presence of Christians in the Gulf at that time is not surprising if one considers the wellknown tolerance of most of the First Abbasid Caliphs such as al-Mahdi (775785), Harun al-Rashid (786-809) or alMamun (830-833). Even if the situation of Christians was closely dependent on the decision made by Muslim rulers, Christians occupied important positions within the Caliph’s administration and at the court (they were philosophers, physicians, writers), testifying that Muslims and Christians used to live together.”
Andrew Lawler makes a similar assertion about Christian presence in alQusur while reviewing a contention made by Magdalena Zurek, who led the Polish mission at al-Qusur. He notes, “Zurek believes that Christians may have settled in the island’s interior in order to keep a low profile long after others in the region had converted to Islam. The small farm and villages, which were eventually abandoned, may mark the last refuge of Christianity in the Gulf in the region. Yet the largest of the two churches appear to have boasted a lofty bell tower that would have been visible far out to sea, hardly the sign of a community fearful of announcing its faith.”