JGF-religion-Roman Catholic-IL-8380.jpg
The Dormition Abbey was built by Benedictine monks on the site of an earlier Byzantine church called Hagia Sion, constructed in the early 5th Century A.D. and destroyed in 612 A.D. by invaders. The site is the traditional location of the death or "long sleep" - the dormition - of the Virgin Mary. The circular church itself is called the Church of the Assumption.