near Behnam's tomb upon receiving instructions to do so from the saint in a dream. This became known as the Monastery of Saints Behnam and Sarah. Hagiography The life of the martyrs is recorded in at least twenty Syriac manuscripts. The earliest surviving manuscript is named the History of Mar Behnam and Sarah. The German historian Gernot Wießner argued it was composed in Late Antiquity, but it has since been proven by more recent studies that it was written in 1197. It was written by an adherent of the Syriac Orthodox Church, and details of the saints' lives are also recorded in other Syriac manuscripts from the late 12th and early 13th centuries. The hagiography may have been written to establish the pre-Islamic foundation of the Monastery of Saints Behnam and Sarah, and thus prevent confiscation from Muslim rulers. A mention of a church of Saint Behnam at Tripoli in 961 by Bar Hebraeus in his Chronography has been argued to suggest that an oral version of the saints' lives had existed prior to the earliest surviving manuscript. Two homilies () on the martyrs named On the Martyrdom of Behnam and his Companions are known to have been written by Jacob of Serugh. The 15th century author Ignatius Behnam Hadloyo also wrote two poems on Behnam, of which five copies survive. Names and places in the hagiography were derived from pre-existing traditions, as demonstrated by the name Sarah, which is known to be the traditional name given in Syriac hagiographies to the sister of a male martyr, such as the Saints Zayna and Sarah, and was derived from Sarah, wife of Abraham. Also, as a consequence of the Christianisation of Assyria, figures and sites from Assyrian history were integrated into Christian narratives, and thus Assur was mentioned as the place of the king's baptism, and the name Sennacherib used for Behnam and Sarah's father was inspired by the Assyrian king Sennacherib (r. 705-681 BC). The French historian Jean Maurice Fiey noted that the Forty Martyrs of Bartella, the village near the monastery of Saints Behnam and Sarah in Iraq, are also commemorated on 10 December in the Martyrology of Rabban Sliba, composed in the late thirteenth century or early fourteenth century. Sarah is also separately commemorated in some Syriac Orthodox calendars on 22 November. Relics The relics of Behnam and Sarah are kept at the Monastery of Saints Behnam and