Symbolic Aspects of the Mosaics in the Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes at Tabgha

The floor mosaics of the church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes at Tabgha, by the northern shore of the See of Galilee, which date back to the 5th century AD, display geometric patterns, as well as animals and plants portrayed in a naturalistic manner. In the transept, a Nilotic landscape appears, with water birds and plants, and several buildings, among which is a “nilometer”. Although this is a rather typical decoration in Late Antiquity (especially in the sanctuaries of the Holy Land), and a legacy of the classical visual tradition (where the same theme often adorned pavements of villas), one peculiarity must be underlined here: this is the earliest example surviving in a Christian building. This paper focuses on the two larger panels of the transept, taking into account the primary sources, and comparing them with further testimonies of a similar use of this peculiar iconography in religious context, in the same chronological frame, and on its possible symbolic meaning, beyond a generic reference to paradise.