The church of Melan is situated on the eastern side of Melan’s mosque, in Gjirokastra district. The excavations of the year 2004 carried out in the site revealed the plan of a one nave church. The church is 9, 89 m – 10, 09 m long and 5, 77 m – 5, 85 m wide. The apse has semicircular shape in the inside and is semi-elliptical from the outside. Its walls are relatively wide; the eastern wall changes from 0, 74 m on the southern side to 0, 89 m on the eastern side. The northern wall is 0, 92 m wide, the southern 0, 81 m, the western 0, 85 m while in the apsidal axe it reaches to 1, 59 m of thickness.
The excavation revealed three types of deposit layers: the first layer (K001) is a mixture of remains deposit; the second layer (K002) is a rubble deposit; and the third layer (K003) contains decomposed wood remains and iron nails.
The first layer covered the monument entirely expanding 2 – 3 m outside its walls. Its depth is 1, 10 m and is composed by organic remains, pile of stones, fragments of tiles, pithos, decorative and architectonic sculpture. The major number of tiles dates to the late antique period, a few pieces belong to Hellenistic period (3rd – 2nd century B.C.) and only a single fragment comes from medieval layers, (13-th century A.D.). The pottery vessels are represented by pithos and amphora’s fragments decorated with incised lines dated to the late antique period. The decorative and architecture sculpture fragments are made of lime stone and marble.
The second archaeological layer is 1, 80 m thick made of collapsed stones of the walls, vault and reddish mortar.
The third layer is part of the church floor; it is 0, 10 m thick and is composed by wood and iron nail remains.
This excavation proved that the church of Melan has a vaulted aula plan shape. The central part has been covered by an elliptical vault standing on four arches. The church has two entrances; the main one is in the middle of the western wall while the other on the western of side of southern wall.
The floor of the church is made of tufa stone and the inside part of the walls church has been covered on lime mortar. Based on the finds and on its architectonical features this church dates to the 17-th century A.D.