Seven Sleepers

In the Islamic and Christian traditions, the Seven Sleepers (hepta koimōmenoi, Septem dormientes), otherwise known as Aṣḥāb al-kahf, Sleepers of Ephesus and Companions of the Cave, is a medieval legend about a group of youths who hid inside a cave outside the city of Ephesus (modern-day Selçuk, Turkey) around AD 250 to escape one of the Roman persecutions of Christians and emerged some 300 years later. Another version of the story appears in the Quran (18:9–26). It was also translated into Persian, Kyrgyz, and Tatar. The earliest version of this story comes from the Syriac bishop Jacob of Serugh (450–521), which is itself derived from an earlier Greek source, now lost. An outline of this tale appears in the writings of Gregory of Tours (538–594) and in History of the Lombards of Paul the Deacon (720–799). The best-known Western version of the story appears in Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend (1259–1266). See BHO (Pueri septem) ##1012-1022; BHG (Pueri VII) ##1593–1599; BHL Dormientes (Septem) Ephesi ##2313–2319. Accounts are found in at least nine medieval languages and preserved in over 200 manuscripts, mainly dating to between the 9th and 13th centuries. These include 104 Latin manuscripts, 40 Greek, 33 Arabic, 17 Syriac, six Ethiopic, five Coptic, two Armenian, one Middle Irish, and one Old English. It was also translated into Sogdian. In the 13th century, the poet Chardri composed an Old French version. The ninth-century Irish calendar Félire Óengusso commemorates the Seven Sleepers on 7 August. The most recent edition of the Roman Martyrology commemorates the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus under the date of 27 July. The Byzantine calendar commemorates them with feasts on 4 August and 22 October. Syriac Orthodox calendars gives various dates: 21 April, 2 August, 13 August, 23 October and 24 October. Early versions do not all agree on or even specify the number of sleepers. The Jews and the Christians of Najran believed in only three brothers; the East Syriac, five.

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Turkey

Turkey (Türkiye, ˈtyɾcije), officially the Republic of Türkiye (Türkiye Cumhuriyeti ˈtyɾcije dʒumˈhuːɾijeti), is a country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in West Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia to the northeast; Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Iran to the east; Iraq to the southeast; Syria and the Mediterranean Sea to the south; the Aegean Sea to the west; and Greece and Bulgaria to the northwest. Cyprus is off the south coast.

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire remained the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in the Mediterranean world.

Seven Sleepers