The Church of Saint Elian

In the old city of Homs, on a street close to the Palmyra Gate. The church was founded in 432 on the spot where Elian, a physician of Emesa, is said to have been killed; he was put to death in 284 by his own father, a Roman officer. But the reason to come is underground: the frescoes uncovered when the plaster was stripped in the restoration of 1969-1970.

Getting there

On Tarafa bin al-Abd Street, beside the Palmyra Gate. A few minutes on foot from the Church of Umm al-Zennar; the two stand in the same quarter.

What is there

The crypt below. The plaster was taken off the walls during the restoration, and under it came paintings of Jesus, Mary, the apostles and the prophets. Their date is disputed: the 12th century at the latest, though the common view puts them in the 6th century. In a small chapel to the right of the crypt stands a sarcophagus, held to hold the remains of Elian. The paintings you see from the nave and the side aisles are new work by two Romanian iconographers, and they run through scenes from Elian’s life.

When to go

The feast of Mar Elian falls on 6 February. Pilgrims come that day from every part of Syria and the church fills; if you want quiet, choose another date.

What most people miss

See the new paintings and the old ones one after the other. Go down from the nave into the crypt and the gap is plain: the same saint’s story, one telling from the last century, the other from at least eight hundred years before it.