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Type: Cross-in-Square
Date: 11th century
Description:
In the southeast of the church of Christ lies the church of Hagios Athanasios (Patriarch of Alexandria) dated to the 11th century. It is a simple, four-columned, cross-in-square church with marble columns.
Due to the damages inflicted by the earthquake in 1981, the second opening of the double-light entrance was revealed (the western entrance with a granite column in the middle and a capital with flat decoration had already existed). In this second opening an exquisite wall painting of Hagia Kyriaki was discovered, which was later removed and is displayed in the Athens Byzantine and Christian Museum. The wall painting is dated to the first half of the 13th century. Only a few fragments are preserved from the rest painted decoration.
In the southern side of the church there is a built altar out of stone and fragments of old marbles, while in the western side there are remains of an older building, probably an exonarthex. Furthermore, in the western part, there are preserved fragments of a semi-circular conch, which is southeast of the church. The existence of the ruins, the altar, the exonarthex, a well outside the altar in the west of the church attest to the existence of a Monastery or an older church, probably an early Christian basilica, where the Byzantine church was built.