Coptic Cairo

The quarter grew inside and around the Roman fortress of Babylon, and its two surviving round towers still frame the entrance, sunk several metres below the modern street because the ground level has risen around them. Inside is a dense knot of churches reached down narrow stone lanes: the Hanging Church, built over the fortress gatehouse so that its floor is suspended above the passage, and Saints Sergius and Bacchus, whose crypt is traditionally shown as a resting place of the Holy Family during the flight into Egypt. The Ben Ezra Synagogue stands among them, the building where the Cairo Geniza documents were found in the nineteenth century, an archive of a thousand years of Mediterranean Jewish life. The Coptic Museum sits at the centre. The whole quarter falls inside the Historic Cairo World Heritage inscription.

History

Settlement here goes back to the 6th century BC, when the Persians built a fort on the Nile north of Memphis, called Babylon, and a canal to the Red Sea; the Romans later took over the fort and rebuilt it nearby as the Babylon Fortress, and Christian tradition holds that the Holy Family stayed on the site of the church of Saints Sergius and Bacchus during the Flight into Egypt. Several churches were built here under Emperor Arcadius (395-408), and after the Arab conquest of the 7th century the Copts were allowed to build more inside the old fortress, among them Saint Barbara and Saints Sergius and Bacchus, of the late 7th or early 8th century. A tradition that the Ben Ezra Synagogue was a church sold to the Jews in 882 is not generally accepted by modern scholars; the Cairo Geniza documents suggest a Jewish presence perhaps as early as the 6th century, and the present building is a reconstruction of the 1890s (Wikipedia, Coptic Cairo).

What you'll find

• The Hanging Church - its nave suspended over the Roman gatehouse.
• Saints Sergius and Bacchus - with the crypt of the Holy Family tradition.
• Ben Ezra Synagogue - where the Cairo Geniza archive was found.
• The Babylon fortress towers - Roman masonry below the modern street level.

When to go

October to April. Sunday mornings are busy with services; weekday mornings are calm. Coptic Christmas on 7 January and Easter fill the churches. Half a day covers the quarter and the museum without hurrying.

Good to know

The lanes are narrow and get congested when several tour groups arrive together. Some churches close without notice for services or restoration. Modest dress is expected and photography inside is often restricted. The synagogue interior may not be photographed at all.

Nearby

The Coptic Museum is inside the quarter; the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As is a short walk north.

Key facts