The room had a doorway and a window that faced east, toward the courtyard, and another window, which faced west. The room had a cross-vault ceiling supported by four corner pillars. The vault was built of flat, roughly hewn stones that were bonded with gray mortar (Kuhla) mixed with small stones, charcoal inclusions and lime, which filled the joints between the stones and was carelessly smeared along their outer surface. The pillars and walls of the room (W106, W107, W109, W110; Fig. 2) were constructed of hewn stones of various shapes, including small ones, which were arranged in uneven courses. Prior to the excavation, the outer face of W110 was dismantled and covered with cement, and an opening was breached in W106 (thickness c. 0.4 m). The core of the wall, discerned inside the doorposts, was composed of small stones bonded with gray mortar (Kuhla) similar to that used in the vault. The room had a white plaster floor (L101; thickness 2–5 cm; Figs. 2: Section 1–1; 3) that was partly destroyed prior to the excavation. The ceiling of the room reached a maximum height of c. 3.2 m above this floor. The floor abutted all four walls of the room, but in the southeastern corner it was situated beneath stones that were attached to the bottom of the pillar. An addition was constructed in this corner, probably to further secure the pillar’s position on the floor. The foundation of W107, which was discerned below the floor, “floated” above brown soil and had a supporting arch incorporated in its construction (Figs. 1:1–1; 4). A similar arch was identified beneath Floor 101, in the southern part of W106. Dark brown soil fills mixed with small and medium stones were exposed below Floor 101. The pottery found in these fills included sherds from the Middle Ages and the Ottoman period: a bowl with a ledge rim from the Fatimid period (eleventh century CE; Fig. 5:1); a frying pan from the Crusader period (mid-twelfth century–thirteenth century CE; Fig. 5:2); a chamber pot from the fifteenth century CE (Fig. 5:3); a jug decorated with a brown-on-white geometric pattern from the fifteenth century CE (Fig. 5:4); a handmade bowl with a folded rim from the Early Ottoman period (sixteenth century–seventeenth century CE; Fig. 5:5); a cooking pot from the Early Ottoman period (sixteenth century–seventeenth century CE; Fig. 5:6); a jar with an upright neck and a thickened rim from the Middle Ottoman period (seventeenth century–eighteenth century CE; Fig. 5:7); and a red burnished tobacco pipe with a rouletted stem that dates to nineteenth century and early twentieth century CE (Fig. 5:8). Two coins were also found: one of Alexander Jannaeus (80/79 BCE or later; IAA 154637) and the other belonging to the Mamluk dynasty (fourteenth century CE; IAA 154638). The finds indicate that the floor was installed no earlier than the nineteenth century CE.
Below the plaster floor ran two parallel walls (W102, W111; 1.8 m apart) built along a southwest–northeast axis, unlike the alignment of the room’s walls. The top of Wall 102 (width 1.2–1.3 m, exposed height 1.1 m; Fig. 6) had been severed by Floor 101, and parts of it were robbed. Nevertheless, both its faces could be reconstructed: they were built of medium and large, roughly hewn stones, and were separated by a core composed of two rows of medium-sized stones and a fill of small stones in between. The wall was built of dry construction (without mortar) and was preserved to a height of five courses; its foundation was not excavated. Two dressed stones whose upper surfaces at the level of the plaster floor were integrated into the western end of the wall; the stones either served as a base for some sort of installation or were pavers laid beside the plaster floor. Walls 106 and 109 were built on top of W102. Wall 111 (exposed height 0.8 m; Fig. 7) was constructed in a similar manner as W102; just three of its courses were exposed on the northern side, as it was not excavated down to its foundation. Parts of the wall were robbed, but the line of the wall could be restored as far east as the doorway. Wall 110 was founded on top of W111.
A water channel (L105; width 0.5 m, depth to the silt covering its floor 0.4 m; Figs. 8, 9) that ran parallel to W110 was exposed between W102 and W111. It was built of small and medium stones, and was covered with large stone slabs. It continued along a straight course to the northeast, perhaps as far as a cistern in the eastern part of the courtyard, c. 12 m east of the doorway. A column drum in secondary use was noted in the southern side of the channel, c. 10 m east from where it opened to the southwest. The channel passed beneath W106 and curved to the south. No remains of plaster were found on its walls.
Two construction phases were discerned in the excavation. Walls 102 and 111, which were oriented differently than the walls of the rooms, were attributed to the early phase. The walls were partially robbed, and apart from the flat stones at the top of the western end of W102 they were not used in the later phase. Neither the foundations of the two walls nor any sort of floor that abutted them were exposed; thus, they could not be dated. They were probably remains of the residential buildings of the Greek Orthodox community which were there in the nineteenth century CE, prior to the construction of the monastery. The plaster floor and the room’s four walls belong to the later phase. Floor 101 was the only floor discovered in the excavation. As it abutted the four walls, it was laid along with the construction of the room. This took place during the nineteenth century CE at the earliest, as evidenced by the ceramic artifacts that were discovered in the fill beneath the floor. The stones attached to the southeastern pillar of the room lei on the floor, suggesting that this was a later repair meant to reinforce the pillar. The channel, probably used to drain water, belongs to the later phase as well, based on its direction: it runs parallel to the southern wall of the room and is not aligned with the walls of the early phase. The later phase represents the construction of the monastery compound, which commenced in the second half of the nineteenth century CE, and includes recent additions and modifications.