Biʾr Naqāṭ is located in the eponymous valley, a tributary of the Wādī Qaṭṭār, in the heart of Ǧabal Qaṭṭār, one of the mountains of the Ǧabal Šāyb al-Banāt massif in the Eastern Desert. The site is situated near the ancient road connecting Abū Šaʿār with Kainopolis/Qinā. It is one of only two sites in the Eastern Desert which have known fourth century Christian remains, the other being Mons Porphyrites in Ǧabal Abū Duḫān, and is the only archaeologically attested early monastic site in the “Interior Desert” (Ghica 2016: 244; Ghica 2019: 128). The site contains a well-preserved church which, thanks to an in-situ stela, is known to have been sponsored by Flavius Julius, governor of the Thebaid, and was constructed between 325 and 339 (Wilkinson 1832: 49; Tregenza 1949: 146; Murray 1951: 113; Meredith 1953: 132; Bernand 1977: 68-70; Łajtar and Wipszycka 1994: 71-72). While it was not originally constructed as a monastic church, the site became home to a monastic community after it fell out of official use, probably correlating with the fourth century abandonment of Dayr Qaṭṭār, a Roman fort located 6.9km NW (Sidebotham, Zitterkopf and Riley 1991: 583a; Ghica 2016: 244). The monastic occupants erected a dozen dry stone buildings in a typological line that we find later in the hermitages of the Wādī ʿAraba and the laura of Abū Daraǧ (Ghica 2019: 128). The clear differences in construction techniques between the church and the cells/hermitages support the asynchronous relationship between the phases of use. The presence of hermits is additionally attested to by literary testimonies, the first of whom is understood to have inhabited the area between 372 and 376 (Murray 1951: 110; Malingrey & Leclerq 1988: 338-339). Analysis of the ceramic assemblages found around the church indicates dates ranging from the fifth/sixth to seventh centuries (Ghica 2016: 245). However, presence of fourth century ceramic cannot be excluded, considering the date of the church’s construction (Ghica 2016: 246).