Saint Catherine's Monastery

The Monastery of St Catherine of Sinai is an important Orthodox monastery located on the hillside of Mount St Catherine in the southern Sinai Peninsula of Egypt. Located at an altitude of 1,570m, it is one of the oldest monasteries in the world still in operation. Its grounds (enclosure and adjoining gardens) constitute the Orthodox Archdiocese of Sinai, canonically linked to the Patriarchate of Jerusalem.

It houses a valuable collection of icons and the second largest library of ancient manuscripts in the world after the Vatican. It has about twenty monks, mostly of Greek origin. The main recruitment centre for novices with a 'desert vocation' is the metochion (outbuilding) that the Monastery of St. Catherine has in Dorylaiou Street, in the Athens district of Ambelokipi.

The Monastery of St Catherine of Sinai has been listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO since 2002 although only a small part of it is open to the public.