sentences:  The earliest known reference to the city of Samalut can be found in a Coptic funerary inscription that possibly dates back to the 5th century AD.Near Samalut is the Coptic Orthodox Monastery of the Virgin Mary at Gebel el-Teir, an important Christian pilgrimage site.Samalut's church was built by Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, in AD 328, on one of the sites where the Holy Family is believed to have stayed during their flight into Egypt.