The monastery was built to celebrate the life of St Paul of Thebes, not be confused with St Paul the apostle, who at age sixteen was Egypt’s youngest known hermit.
Like his friend and counterpart St Anthony, St Paul was also born into a wealthy family but lost his parents at a young age. Fearing persecution in Alexandria, he fled to the eastern desert where he enjoyed a pious yet solitary existence in a cave.
Having heard that a man even more devout than himself existed in the same region, St Anthony set out to find St Paul, and later the two of them became friends.
According to the story, sensing his own death was imminent (he was well over 100 after all), Paul begged Anthony to fetch the robe of Pope Anthanasius for him to be buried in. Anthony dutily obliged but when he returned with the robe Paul was already dead.
Lions appeared and dug a grave for Paul and as promised Anthony dressed Paul's corpse in the tunic he had request. Paul’s own tunic was given to the pope who wore it on Christmas and Easter.
Paul’s followers built the monastery around the cave where he had lived. Like St Anthony's Monastery, it was ransacked several times over the centuries by marauding Bedouin tribes.
