Thamanin

Thamanin
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Alternative name	Arabic: ثَمَانِيْن Thamānīn[1] Assyrian: Tumurri / Tumurru[2][3] Armenian: Թմորիկ‘, romanized: Tmorik‘[4] Latin: Tamonitis / Tamoritis[4]
Location	Şırnak Province, Southeastern Anatolia, Turkey
Region	Anatolia / Mesopotamia, Middle or Near East
Coordinates	37°19′47.36″N 42°28′6.91″E / 37.3298222°N 42.4685861°E / 37.3298222; 42.4685861
Type	Settlement
Part of	Turkey
Length	> 200 m
Width	> 200 m
History
Builder	Nuh (Noah) et al.
Abandoned	c. CE 1265[1]
Site notes
Excavation dates	2013[1]
Archaeologists	S. C. Compton[1]
Condition	Ruined
Ownership	Public

Thamanin,^[5] also spelled Themanin^[6] (Arabic: ثَمَانِيْن, romanized: Thamānīn, lit. 'Eighty'), was a town located to the south of Mount Judi in southeast Turkey. Muslims and other people believe that Mount Judi is the resting place of the Ark of Nuh or Noah.^[1][7]

Historical significance

Since at least 697 B.C.E., it was often held that after the ark came to rest on the mountain, Noah and the survivors of the flood (who were thought to have numbered 80) came down from it, and built this town to the south of the mountain, hence the name of Thamanin^[5] or Themanin,^[6] meaning "Eighty".^[1][7] In his commentary about the Quran (11:4; the verse that mentions the landing of Noah's ark upon Al-Judiy), the English Orientalist George Sale said:^[7]

Mount Al-Judi (which seems to be a corruption, though it be constantly so written by the Arabs, for Jordi, or Giordi) is also called Thamanin (Geogr. Nub. p. 202), probably from a town at the foot of it (D'Herbel. Bibl. Orient. p. 404 and 676, and Agathiam, 1. 14, p. 135), so named from the number of persons saved in the ark, the word thamanin signifying eighty, and overlooks the country of Diyar Rab ah, near the cities of Mawsel, Forda, and Jazirat Ebn Omar, which last place one affirms to be but four miles from the place of the ark, and says that a Mohammedan temple was built there with the remains of the vessel by the Khalif Omar Ebn Abd'alaziz, whom he by mistake calls Omar Ebn Khattab (Benjamin. Itiner. p. 61). ... The relics of the ark were also to be seen here in the time of Epiphanius, if we may believe him (Epiph. Haeres. 18); and we are told the emperor Heraclius went from the town of Thamanin up to the mountain Al-Judi, and saw the place of the ark (Elmacin. 1. 1. c. 1 ).

— George Sale, 1734; p. 214-215

Thamanin was known to the Assyrians as Tumurri or Tumurru,^[2][3] to the Romans as Tamonitis or Tamoritis, and to the Armenians as Թմորիկ‘.^[1][4]

Geography

After using satellite photography to research the area, besides earlier works, S. C. Compton noticed a circular tel at the foot of this mountain, measuring over 200 m (660 ft) in diameter. Located east of Cizre (formerly "Jazirat ibn `Umar", at the headwaters of the Tigris River, near the modern border with Syria, and that of Iraq), southeast of Şah (Çağlayan), and northwest of the Iraqi city of Zakho, Compton visited the tel in 2013, and reckoned that this was the most likely location of Thamanin.^[1] It is worth mentioning that Cizre is one of the places that is thought to have the tomb of Noah.^[8]