Saidnaya

Saidnaya is a city located in the mountains, 1,500 m above sea level, 27 km north of the city of Damascus in Syria. It is the home of a Greek Orthodox monastery traditionally held to have been founded by Byzantine emperor Justinian I, and where a renowned icon of the Virgin Mary is revered by both Christians and Muslims to this day. The town is noted for the large number of Aramaic speakers, along with nearby Maaloula and few smaller towns nearby such as Maarat Saidnaya. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics, Saidnaya had a population of 25,194 in the 2004 census.