CHURCH OF THE VIRGINS' BELT (UM AL-ZUNNAR)

Today, the church is the former seat of the Syrian Catholic Patriarchate. The place would not be of any particular interest if, in July 1953, there was not a piece of cloth, below the altar, which passes to be a belt of the Virgin Mary. The keeper of the place will show you the belt, a piece of white cloth stuffed in a stone tank. It is 74 cm in length, 5 cm wide, 3 cm thick and is probably silk and linen. Its authenticity would be attested by the existence of a th century chapel under the present church. The whole lay under the altar, returning to this place by those who discovered it first, the men entrusted with the restoration of the church in 1852. The objects surrounding the belt at the time of its discovery are displayed in a church chapel: the stone tank in which the belt has been found, the copper disk which covers the tank and a metal cylinder containing a fragment of human bone with no great relation to the rest. On the details, very good brochure in English.