chapter 12

, the historian says that the number of sufferers was so great that no account could be kept of them in the archives of the Church. The memory of this decade of horrors has never died out in Rome. We have still a local tradition, not altogether unfounded, of ten thousand Christians who were condemned to quarry materials for Diocletian's Baths, and who were put to death after the dedication of the building.

Towards the end of 306, Maxentius stopped the persecution, but the true era of peace did not begin before 312, which is the date of Constantine's famous "edict of Milan," granting to the Church liberty and free possession of her places of worship and cemeteries forever.

The events of which I have given a summary sketch are beautifully illustrated by the discoveries which have been made in early Christian cemeteries, from May 31, 1578, which is the date of the discovery of the first catacomb, to the present day.

From the time of the apostles to the first persecution of Domitian, Christian tombs, whether above or below ground, were built with perfect impunity and in defiance of public opinion. We have been accustomed to consider the catacombs of Rome as crypts plunged in total darkness, and penetrating the bowels of the earth at unfathomable depths. This is, in a certain measure, the case with those catacombs, or sections of catacombs, which were excavated in times of persecution; but not with those belonging to the first century. The cemetery of these members of Domitian's family who had embraced the gospel--such as Flavius Clemens, Flavia Domitilla, Plautilla, Petronilla, and others--reveals a bold example of publicity.

The entrance to the crypt, discovered in 1714 and again in 1865, near the farmhouse of Tor Marancia, at the first milestone of the Via Ardeatina, is hewn out of a perpendicular cliff, which is conspicuous from the high road (the modern Via delle Sette Chiese). The crypt is approached through a vestibule, which was richly decorated with terra-cotta carvings, and, on the frieze, a monumental inscription enclosed by an elaborate frame. No pagan mausolea of the Via Appia or the Via Latina show a greater sense of security or are placed more conspicuously than this early Christian tomb. The frescoes on the ceiling of the vestibule, representing biblical scenes, such as Daniel in the lions' den, the history of Jonah, etc., were exposed to daylight, and through the open door could be seen by the passer. No precaution was taken to conceal these symbolic scenes from profane or hostile eyes. We regret the loss of the inscription above the entrance, which, besides the name of the owner of the crypt, probably contained the _lex monumenti_, and a formula specifying the religion of those buried within. In this very catacomb, a few steps from the vestibule, an inscription has been found, in which a Marcus Aurelius Restitutus declares that he has built a tomb for himself and his relatives (_sibi et suis_), provided they were believers in Christ (_fidentes in Domino_). Another tombstone, discovered in 1864, in the Villa Patrizi, near the catacombs of Nicomedes, states that none might be buried in the tomb to which it was attached except those who belonged to the creed (_pertinentes ad religionem_) of the founder.

[Illustration: Entrance to the Crypt of the Flavians.]

The time soon came when these frank avowals of Christianity were either impossible or extremely hazardous; and although legally a tomb continued to be a _locus religiosus_, no matter what the creed of the deceased had been, a vague sense of anxiety was felt by the Church, lest even these last refuges should be violated by the mob and its leaders. Hence the extraordinary development which underground cemeteries underwent towards the end of the first and the beginning of the second century. These catacombs were considered by the law to be the property of the citizen who owned the ground above, and who either excavated them at his own cost, or gave the privilege of doing so to the Church. This is the reason why the names of our oldest suburban cemeteries are derived, not from the illustrious saints buried in them, but from the owner of the property under which the catacomb was first excavated. Balbina, Callixtus, Domitilla were never laid to rest in the catacombs which bear their names. Prætextatus, Apronianus, the Jordans, Novella, Pontianus, and Maximus, after whom other cemeteries were named, are all totally unknown persons. When these cemeteries became places of worship and pilgrimage, after the Peace of Constantine, the old names which had sheltered them from the violence of persecutors were abandoned, and replaced by those of local martyrs. Thus the catacomb of Domitilla became that of Nereus and Achilleus; that of Balbina was named for S. Mark; that of Callixtus for SS. Sixtus and Cæcilia; and that of Maximus for S. Felicitas.

One characteristic of Christian epigraphy shows what a comparatively safe place the catacombs were. Inscriptions belonging to them never contain those requests to the passer to respect the tomb, which are so frequent in sepulchral inscriptions from tombs above-ground, and which sometimes, on Christian as well as pagan graves, take the form of an imprecation. An epitaph discovered by Hamilton near Eumenia, Phrygia, contains this rather violent formula: "May the passer who damages my tomb bury all his children at the same time." In another, found near the church of S. Valeria, in Milan, the imprecation runs: "May the wrath of God and of his Christ fall on the one who dares to disturb the peace of our sleep."

The safety of the catacombs was not due to the fact that their existence was known only to the proselytes of Christ. The magistrates possessed a thorough knowledge of their location, number, and extent; and we have evidence of raids and descents by the police on extraordinary occasions, as, for instance, during the persecutions of Valerian and Diocletian. The ordinary entrances to the catacombs, which were known to the police, were sometimes walled up or otherwise concealed, and new secret outlets opened through abandoned pozzolana quarries (_arenariæ_). Some of these outlets have been discovered, or are to be seen, in the cemeteries of Agnes, Thrason, Callixtus, and Castulus. In May, 1867, while excavating on the southern boundary line of the Cemetery of Callixtus, de Rossi found himself suddenly confronted with sandpits, the galleries of which came in contact with those of the cemetery several times. The passage from one to the other had been most ingeniously disguised by the _fossores_, as those who dug the catacombs were called.[149]

The defence of these cemeteries in troubled times must have caused great anxiety to the Church. Tertullian tells how the population of Carthage, excited against the Christians, sought to obtain from Hilarianus, governor of Africa, the destruction of their graves. "Let them have no burial-ground!" (_areæ eorum non sint_) was the rallying cry of the mob.

The catacombs are unfit for men to live in, or to stay in even for a few days. The tradition that Antonio Bosio spent seventy or eighty consecutive hours in their depths is unfounded. When we hear of Popes, priests, or their followers seeking refuge in catacombs, we must understand that they repaired to the buildings connected with them, such as the lodgings of the keepers, undertakers, and local clergymen. Pope Boniface I., when molested by Symmachus and Eulalius, found shelter in the house connected with the Cemetery of Maximus on the Via Salaria. The crypts themselves were sought as a refuge only in case of extreme emergency. Thus Barbatianus, a priest from Antiochia, concealed himself in the Catacombs of Callixtus to escape the wrath of Galla Placidia.

Many attempts have been made to estimate the extent of our catacombs, the length of their galleries, and the number of tombs which they contain. Michele Stefano de Rossi, brother of the archæologist, gives the following results for the belt of catacombs within three miles of the gates of Servius:[150]--

(A) Surface of tufa beds, capable of being excavated into catacombs, 67,000,000 square feet.

(B) Surface actually excavated into catacombs, from one to four stories deep, 22,500,000 square feet,--more than a square mile.

(C) Aggregate length of galleries, calculated on the average construction of six different catacombs, 866 kilometres, equal to 587 geographical miles.

The sides of the galleries contain several rows of loculi, sometimes six or eight. Some bodies are buried under the floor, or in the cubiculi which open right and left at short intervals. Assuming these galleries to be capable of containing two bodies per metre, the number of Christians buried in the catacombs, within three miles from the gates of Servius, may be estimated at a minimum of 1,752,000.

The construction of this prodigious labyrinth required the excavation and removal of 96,000,000 cubic feet of solid rock.

With regard to the number of inscriptions, I quote the following passage from Northcote's "Epitaphs," page 3: "Of Christian inscriptions in Rome, during the first six centuries, de Rossi has studied more than fifteen thousand, the immense majority of which were taken from the catacombs; and he tells us there is still an average yearly addition of about five hundred, derived from the same source. This number, vast as it is, is but a poor remnant of what once existed. From the collections made in the eighth and ninth centuries it appears that there were once at least one hundred and seventy ancient Christian inscriptions in Rome, which had an historical or monumental character; written generally in metre, and to be seen at that time in the places which they were intended to illustrate. Of these only twenty-six remain, either whole or in parts. In the Roman topographies of the seventh century, one hundred and forty sepulchres of famous martyrs and confessors are enumerated; we have recovered only twenty inscribed memorials, to assist us in the identification of these. Only nine epitaphs have come to light belonging to the bishops of Rome during the same six centuries; and yet, during that period, there were certainly buried in the suburbs of the city upwards of sixty. Thus, whatever facts we take as the basis of our calculation, it would seem that scarcely a seventh part of the original wealth of the Roman church in memorials of this kind has survived the wreck of ages; and de Rossi gives it as his conviction that there were once _more than one hundred thousand_ of them."

When the catacombs began to be better known to the general public, and were visited by crowds of the devout or curious, they became one of the marvels of Rome. Travellers who so admired the _syringes_ or crypts of the kings of Thebes, calling them [Greek: ta thaumata] (the wonders), could not help being struck with awe at the great work accomplished by our Christian community in less than three centuries. An inscription found by Deville at Thebes, in one of the royal crypts, and published in the "Archives des missions scientifiques," 1866, vol. ii. p. 484, thus refers to the parallel wonders of Roman and Egyptian catacombs: "Antonius Theodorus, intendant of Egypt and Phoenicia, who has spent many years in the Queen-city of Rome, has seen the wonders ([Greek: ta thaumata]) both there and here." The allusion to the catacombs in comparison with the _syringes_ is evident. The inscription dates from the second half of the fourth century.

To the edict of Milan, and to the peace which it gave to the Church, we must attribute the origin of the decadence of underground cemeteries. Burial in open-air cemeteries having become secure once more, there was no reason why the faithful should give preference to the unhealthy and overcrowded crypts below. The example of desertion was set by the Popes themselves. Melchiades (311-314), who was the first to occupy the Lateran palace after the victory of the Church, was the last Pope buried near his predecessors _in coemeteris Callisti in cripta_. Sylvester, his successor, was buried in a chapel built expressly, above the crypt of Priscilla, Mark above the crypts of Balbina, Julius above those of Calepodius, and so on. Still, the desire of securing a grave in proximity to the shrine of a martyr was so intense that the use of the catacombs lasted for a century longer, although in diminishing proportions. When a gallery is discovered which contains more graves than usual, and has been excavated even in the narrow ledges of rock which separated the original loculi, or else at the corners of the crossings, which were usually left untouched, as protection against the caving-in of the earth, we may be sure we are approaching a martyr's altar-tomb. Sometimes the paintings which decorate a martyr's _cubiculum_ have been disfigured and their inscriptions effaced by an overzealous devotee. The accompanying cut shows the damage inflicted on a picture of the Good Shepherd in the cubiculum of S. Januarius, in the Catacombs of Prætextatus, by an unscrupulous disciple who wished to be buried as near as possible to his patron-saint.

[Illustration: Cubiculum of Januarius.]

By the end of the fourth century burials in catacombs became rare, and still more between 400 and 410. They were apparently given up altogether after 410. The development of open-air cemeteries increased in proportion, those of S. Lorenzo and S. Paolo fuori le Mura being among the most popular. In 1863, when the entrance-gate to the modern Camposanto adjoining S. Lorenzo was built, fifty tombs, mostly unopened, were found in a space ninety feet long by forty feet wide. Since that time five hundred tombstones have been gathered in the neighborhood of that favorite church. As regards S. Paul's cemetery, more than one thousand inscriptions, whole or in fragments, were found in rebuilding the basilica and its portico, after the fire of 1823;[151] two hundred in the excavations of S. Valentine's basilica, outside the Porta del Popolo. These last excavations are the only ones illustrating a Christian cemetery which are left visible; but their importance is limited. The cemeteries of Arles and Pola, alluded to by Dante, have disappeared; and so has the magnificent one of the officers and men employed in the Roman arsenal at Concordia Sagittaria, which was discovered in 1873, near Portogruaro, by Perulli and Bartolini. This cemetery, which contains, in the section already explored, nearly two hundred sarcophagi, cut in limestone, in the shape of Petrarch's coffin, at Arquà, or Antenor's at Padua, was wrecked by Attila in 452, and buried soon after by an inundation of the river Tagliamento, which spread masses of mud and sand over the district, and raised its level five feet. The accompanying plate is from a photograph taken at the time of the discovery.

I have just stated that burial in catacombs seems to have been abandoned in 410, because no inscription of a later date has yet been found. The reader will easily perceive the reason for the abandonment. On August 10, 410, Rome was stormed by Alaric, and the suburbs devastated. This fatal year marks the end of a great and glorious era in Christian epigraphy, and in the history of catacombs the end of the work of the _fossores_. More fatal still was the barbaric invasion of 457. The actual destruction began in 537, during the siege of Rome by Vitiges. The biographer of Pope Silverius expressly says: "Churches and tombs of martyrs have been destroyed by the Goths" (_ecclesiæ et corpora sanctorum martyrum exterminata sunt a Gothis_). It is difficult to explain why the Goths, confessed and even bigoted Christians (Arians) as they were, and full of respect for the basilicas of S. Peter and S. Paul, as Procopius declares, should have ransacked the catacombs, violated the tombs of martyrs, and broken their historical inscriptions. Perhaps it was because none of the barbarians could read Latin or Greek epitaphs, and make the distinction between pagan and Christian cemeteries; or perhaps they were moved by the desire of finding hidden treasures, or securing relics of saints. Whatever may have been the reason of their behavior, we must remember that two encampments, at least, of the Goths were just over catacombs and around their entrances; one on the Via Salaria, over those of Thrason; the other on the Via Labicana, above those of Peter and Marcellinus. The barbarians could not resist the temptation of exploring those subterranean wonders; indeed they were obliged to do so by the most elementary rules of precaution in order to insure the safety of their intrenchments against surprises. Here I have to record a remarkable coincidence. In each of these two catacombs the following memorial tablet has been seen or found, written in distichs by Pope Virgilius:--

[Illustration: CHRISTIAN MILITARY CEMETERY OF CONCORDIA SAGITTARIA]

"When the Goths pitched their camps under the walls of Rome, they declared an impious war against the Saints:

"And destroyed in their sacrilegious attack the tombs dedicated to the memory of martyrs:

"Whose epitaphs, composed by Pope Damasus, have been destroyed.

"Pope Virgilius, having witnessed the destruction, has repaired the tombs, the inscriptions, and the underground sanctuaries after the retreat of the Goths."

The repairs must have been made in haste, between March, 537, the date of the flight of Vitiges, and the following November, the date of the journey of Virgilius to Constantinople, from which he never returned. Traces of this Pope's restorations have been found in other catacombs. In those of Callixtus the fragments of a tablet, dedicated by Damasus to S. Eusebius, have been found, dispersed over a large area, and also a copy set up by Virgilius in the place of the original. In those of Hippolytus, on the Via Tiburtina, an inscription was discovered in 1881, which stated that the "sacred caverns" had been restored _præsule Virgilio_. The example of Virgilius and his successors in the See of Rome was followed by private individuals. The tomb of Crysanthus and Daria on the Via Salaria was restored, after the retreat of the barbarians, _pauperis ex censu_, that is to say, with the modest means of a devotee.

Nibby has attributed the origin of cemeteries within the walls to the invasion of Vitiges, burial within the city limits having been strictly forbidden by the laws of Rome. But the law seems to have been practically disregarded even before the Gothic wars. Christians were buried in the Prætorian camp, and in the gardens of Mæcenas, during the reign of Theodoric (493-526). I have mentioned this particular because it marks another step towards the abandonment of suburban cemeteries. The country around Rome having become insecure and deserted, it was deemed necessary to place within the protection of the city walls the bodies of martyrs who had been buried at a great distance from the gates. The first translation took place in 648: the second in 682, when the bodies of Primus and Felicianus were removed from Nomentum, and those of Viatrix, Faustinus and Simplicius from the _Lucus Arvalium_ (Monte delle Piche, by la Magliana). The last blow to the catacombs was given by Paschal I. (817-824). Contemporary documents mention innumerable transferences of bodies. The mosaic legend of the apse of S. Prassede says that Pope Paschal buried the bodies of many saints within its walls.[152]

The official catalogue of the remains removed on July 20, 817, which was compiled by the Pope's notary and engraved on marble, has come down to us. It speaks of the translation of twenty-three hundred bodies, most of which were buried under the chapel of S. Zeno, which Paschal I. had built as a memorial to his mother, Theodora Episcopa. The legend in the apse of S. Cæcilia speaks, likewise, of the transference to her church of bodies "which had formerly reposed in crypts" (_quæ primum in cryptis pausabant_): among them those of Cæcilia herself, Valerianus, Tiburtius, and Maximus. The finding and removal of Cæcilia's remains from the Catacombs of Callixtus is one of the most graceful episodes in the life of Paschal I. He describes it at length in a letter addressed to the people of Rome.

After many unsuccessful attempts to discover the coffin of the saint, he had come to the conclusion that it must have been stolen by the Lombards, when they were besieging the city in 755. S. Cæcilia, however, told him in a vision where her grave was; and hurrying to the catacombs of the Appian Way he at last discovered her crypt and coffin, together with those of fourteen Popes, from Zephyrinus to Melchiades. It is only fair to say that the discoveries made in this very crypt, between 1850 and 1853, confirm the account of Paschal in its minutest details.

The first half of the ninth century thus marks the final abandonment of the catacombs, and the cessation of divine worship in their historical crypts. In later times we find little or no mention of them in Church annals. When we read of Nicholas I. (858-867) and of Paschal II. (1099-1118) visiting the cemeteries, we must believe that their visits were to the basilicas erected over the catacombs, and to their special crypts, not to the catacombs themselves. In the chronicle of the monastery of S. Michael ad Mosam we read of a pilgrim of the eleventh century who obtained relics of saints "from the keeper of a certain cemetery, in which lamps are always burning." He refers to the basilica of S. Valentine and the small hypogæum attached to it (discovered in 1887), not to catacombs in the true sense of the word. The very last account referring directly to them dates from the time of Pope Nicholas I. (858-867) who is said to have restored the crypt of Mark on the Via Ardeatina, and of Felix, Abdon, and Sennen on the Via Portuensis. At this time also the visits of pilgrims, to whose itineraries, or guidebooks, we are indebted for so much knowledge of the topography of suburban cemeteries, come to an end. The best itineraries are those of Einsiedeln, Salzburg, Wurzburg, and William of Malmesbury; and the list of the oils from the lamps burning before the tombs of martyrs, which were collected by John, abbot of Monza, at the request of queen Theodolinda. The pilgrims left many records of their visits scratched on the walls of the sanctuaries; and to these _graffiti_ also we are indebted for much information, since they contain formulas of devotion addressed to the saint of the place. They are very interesting in their simplicity of thought and diction, as are generally the memoirs of early pilgrims and pilgrimages. I shall mention one, discovered not many years ago in the cemetery of Mustiola at Chiusi. It is a plain tombstone, inscribed with the words:--

HIC · POSITUS · EST · PEREGRINUS · CICONIAS · CUIUS · NOMEN · DEUS · SCIT

"Here is buried a pilgrim from Thrace, whose name is known only to God." The tale is simple and touching. A pilgrim on his way to Rome, or back to his country, was overtaken by death at Chiusi, before he could make himself known to those who had come to his help. They could only suppose he had come from Thrace, the country of the Cicones, possibly from the language he spoke, or from the costume he wore.

On May 31, 1578, a workman, while digging a sandpit in the vineyard of Bartolomeo Sanchez at the second milestone of the Via Salaria, came upon a Christian cemetery containing frescoes, sarcophagi, and inscriptions. This unexpected discovery created a great sensation,[153] and the report was circulated that an underground city had been found. The leading men of the age hastened to the spot; among them Baronius, who speaks of these wondrous crypts three or four times in his annals.[154] It seems that the network of galleries, crossing one another at various angles, the skylights, the wells, the symmetry of the cubiculi and arcosolia, the number of loculi with which the sides of the galleries were honeycombed, affected the imagination of visitors even more than the pictures, the sarcophagi, and the epitaphs. The subjects of the frescoes were so varied as to contain almost the whole cycle of early Christian symbolism. There were the Good Shepherd and the Praying Soul, Noah and the ark, Daniel and the lions, Moses striking the rock, the story of Jonah, the sacrifice of Isaac, the three men in the fiery furnace, the resurrection of Lazarus, etc. The bas-reliefs of the marble coffins represented Christian love-feasts and pastoral scenes. The epitaphs contained simply names, except one, which was raised by a girl "to her sweet nurse Paulina, who dwells in Christ among the blessed." These pious memorials of the primitive church led the learned visitors to investigate their meaning and value, as well as the history and name of those mysterious labyrinths. The origin of Christian archæology, therefore, really dates from May 1, 1578. Antonio Bosio, the Columbus of subterranean Rome, was but three years old at that time, but he seems to have developed his marvellous instinct on the strength of what he saw in the Vigna Sanchez in his boyhood. The crypts, however, had but a short life: the quarry-men damaged and robbed them to such an extent that, when Bosio began his career in 1593, every trace of them had disappeared. They have never been found since. We can only point out to the lover of these studies the site of the Vigna Sanchez. It is marked by a monumental gate, on the right side of the Via Salaria, crowned by the well-known coat-of-arms of the della Rovere family, to whom the property was sold towards the end of the sixteenth century. The gate is a little more than a mile from the Porta Salaria.

From that time to the first quarter of the present century, we have to tell the same long tale of destruction. And who were responsible for this wholesale pillage? The very men--Aringhi, Boldetti, Marangoni, Bottari--who devoted their lives, energies and talents to the study of the catacombs, and to whom we are indebted for many standard works on Christian archæology. Such was the spirit of the age. Whether an historical inscription came out of one cemetery or another did not matter to them; the topographical importance of discoveries was not appreciated. Written or engraved memorials were sought, not for the sake of the history of the place to which they belonged, but to ornament houses, museums, villas, churches and monasteries. In 1863, de Rossi found a portion of the Cemetery of Callixtus, near the tombs of the Popes, in incredible confusion and disorder: loculi ransacked, their contents stolen, their inscriptions broken and scattered far and wide, and the bones themselves taken out of their graves. The perpetrators of the outrage had taken care to leave their names written in charcoal or with the smoke of tallow candles; they were men employed by Boldetti in his explorations of the catacombs, between 1713 and 1717. Some of the tombstones were removed by him to S. Maria in Trastevere, and inserted in the floor of the nave. Benedict XIV. took away the best, and placed them in the Vatican Library. They have now migrated again to the Museo Epigrafico of the Lateran Palace. Those left in the floor of S. Maria in Trastevere were removed to the vestibule of the church in 1865.

In 1714, some beautiful paintings of the first century were discovered in the crypt of the Flavian family (Domitilla) at Torre Marancia. They were examined by well-known archæologists and churchmen, whose names are scratched or written on the walls: Boldetti, Marangoni, Bottari, Leonardo da Porto Maurizio, and G. B. de Rossi (the last two since canonized by the Church), and by hundreds of priests, nuns, missionaries, and pilgrims. No mention is made of this beautiful discovery in contemporary books; but an attempt was made to steal the frescoes, which resulted, as usual, in their total destruction.[155] The catacombs owe their sad fate to the riches which they contained. In times of persecution, when the _fossores_ were pressed by too much work and memorial tablets could not be secured in time, it was customary for the survivors to mark the graves of the dear ones either with a symbol, a word, or a date scratched in the fresh cement; or with some object of identification, such as glass cups, medallions, cameos, intaglios, objects cut in rock crystal, coral, etc. If the work of exploration has been carried on actively in the last three centuries, it is on account of the rich harvest which searching

## parties were sure to reap whenever they chanced to come across a

catacomb or part of a catacomb, yet unexplored, with these signs of recognition untouched.

The best works of the glyptic art, the rarest gems, coins, and medallions of European cabinets have come to light in this way. Pietro Sante Bartoli, who chronicled the discoveries made in Rome in the second half of the seventeenth century, speaks several times of treasure-trove in catacombs:[156]

"In a Christian cemetery discovered outside the Porta Portese, in the vineyard of a priest named degli Effetti, many relics of martyrs have been found, a beautiful set of the rarest medallions (_bellissima serie di medaglioni rarissimi_), works in metal and crystal, engraved stones, jewels, and other curios and interesting objects, many of which were sold by the workmen at low prices." And again: "The opening of a catacomb was discovered by accident under the Casaletto of Pius V., outside the Porta S. Pancrazio. Although the crypt had never been entered, and promised to be very rich, no excavations were attempted, owing to the dangerous condition of the rock. One object only was extracted from the ruinous cavern; a polychrome cameo of marvellous beauty (_di meravigliosa bellezza_) representing a Bacchanalian. The stone measured sixteen inches in length by ten in width. It was given to cardinal Massimi."[157]

The number of catacombs has been greatly exaggerated. Panvinius and Baronius stated it as forty-three; Aringhi and his followers raised this number to sixty. De Rossi, however, in vol. i., p. 206, of the "Roma sotterranea" proves that the number of catacombs excavated during the first three centuries, within a radius of three miles from the walls of Servius Tullius, is but twenty-six; besides eleven of much less importance, and five which were excavated after the Peace of Constantine.

It would be impossible to give even a summary description of these forty-two cemeteries, within the limits of the present chapter. De Rossi's account of Lucina's crypts in the Cemetery of Callixtus occupies one hundred and thirty-two folio pages, and has required thirty-five plates of illustration. I must confine myself to the mention of the few discoveries, connected with the history and topography of underground Rome, which have come within my personal experience, or which I have had occasion to study.

THE CATACOMBS OF GENEROSA. In 1867, while watching with my friend commendatore Visconti (the present director of the Vatican Museum) the excavations of the Sacred Grove of the Arvales, on the Via Campana, five miles outside the Porta Portese, I witnessed for the first time the discovery of a catacomb. The experience could not have been more pleasant, nor the history of the first occupants of these crypts more interesting.

In the persecution of Diocletian two brothers, Simplicius and Faustinus, were tortured and put to death for their faith, and their bodies were thrown into the Tiber from the bridge of Æmilius Lepidus. The stream carried them to a considerable distance, and their young sister Beatrix, who was anxiously watching the banks of the river for the recovery of their dear remains, discovered them lying in the shallows of la Magliana, near the grove of the Arvales. She buried them in a small Christian cemetery which a certain Generosa had excavated close by, under the boundary line of the grove itself. Beatrix, left alone in the world, found shelter in the house of one of the Lucinas; but the persecutors, to whom her pious action had evidently been reported, discovered her retreat, and killed her by suffocation, seven months after the execution of Simplicius and Faustinus. Lucina laid her to rest in the same cemetery of Generosa, by the side of her brothers. This touching story is related in contemporary documents.

Pope Damasus, who in his younger days had been notary and stenographer of the church of Rome, and was acquainted with every detail of the last persecution, raised a small oratory to the memory of the three martyrs, and sanctified the ground which for eleven centuries had been the seat of the worship of the Dea Dia. The chapel lasted until the pontificate of Leo II., when it became evident that the only way of saving the remains of Beatrix, Simplicius, and Faustinus from profanation and robbery, was to remove them from a place so conspicuous for many miles around, and directly in the path of pirates and invaders from the sea, and to place them under the protection of the city walls. The translation took place in 682; the bodies were removed to the church of Santa Biviana, or the Bibiana, on the Esquiline, and placed in a sarcophagus, with the record: "Here lie in peace Simplicius and Faustinus, martyrs, drowned in the Tiber and buried in the cemetery of Generosa, above the landing-place called ad Sextum Philippi." Sarcophagus and inscription are still in existence. The discovery of the oratory of Pope Damasus and the cemetery of Generosa took place, as already stated, in the spring of 1867, when a fragment of the architrave of the altar was found in front of the apse, inscribed with the names, ··· STINO · VIATRICI, engraved in the best Damasian calligraphy. The spelling of the second name deserves attention, because it is certainly intentional, as Damasus and his engraver Furius Dionysius Philocalus are distinguished for absolute epigraphic correctness. _Viatrix_, the feminine of _Viator_, is altogether different from _Beatrix_, and has its own Christian meaning, as an allusion to the eventful journey of human life. Must we take the word _Beatrix_ as a new form, more or less connected with the adjective _beatus_, or as a corruption of the genuine name? No doubt it is a corruption, as the oldest martyrologies and liturgies have the genuine spelling. The substitution of the B instead of the V took place in the eighth or ninth century, and appears for the first time in the Codex of Berne. The grammarian who wrote it was evidently of the opinion that _Viatrix_ was not the right spelling; and so the true and beautiful name of the sister of Faustinas and Simplicius became corrupted.

[Illustration: Sancta Viatrix.]

The accompanying illustration represents the portrait of Viatrix discovered in the Catacomb of Generosa in the spring of 1868.

THE CEMETERY OF DOMITILLA. The farm of Torre Marancia, at the crossing of the Via Ardeatina and the Via delle Sette Chiese, is familiar to archæologists on account of the successful excavations which the duchess of Chablais made there in the spring of the years 1817 and 1822. Bartolomeo Borghesi, who first visited them in April, 1817, describes the remains of a noble villa of the first century, with mosaic pavements, fountains, statuary, candelabra, and frescos. The pictures of Pasiphae, Canace, Phædra, Myrrha, and Scylla, which are now in the Cabinet of the Aldobrandini Marriage, in the Vatican Library, were discovered in one of the bedrooms of the villa. Other works of art, now exhibited in the third compartment of the Galleria dei Candelabri, were found in the peristyle. An exact description of these discoveries, with maps and illustrations, is given by Marchese Biondi in a volume called "Monumenti Amaranziani," published in Rome in 1825.

The Villa Amaranthiana, from which the modern name of Torre Marancia is derived, belonged to two ladies, one of imperial descent, Flavia Domitilla, a relative of Domitian and Titus, the other of patrician birth, Munatia Procula, the daughter of Marcus. Domitilla's name appears twice in documents attesting her ownership of the ground; the first is the grant of a sepulchral area, measuring thirty-five feet by forty, to Sergius Cornelius Julianus _ex indulgentia Flaviæ Domitillæ_; the other mentions the construction of another tomb, _Flaviæ Domitillæ divi Vespasiani neptis beneficio_.[158] These concessions refer to burial-plots above ground, on the Via Ardeatina. Much more important was the permission given by Domitilla for the excavation of a catacomb in the service of the Church, which had just been established in Rome by the apostles. The catacomb consisted originally of two sections; one for the use of those members of the imperial Flavian family who had been converted to the gospel, and one for common use. I have already given a brief account of the first (see p. 10). The entrance to the crypts was built in a conspicuous place, under the safeguard of the law which guaranteed the inviolability of private tombs. The place can still be visited. On each side of the entrance are apartments for the celebration of anniversary banquets, the [Greek: agapai] or love-feasts of the early Church. Those on the left are decorated in the so-called Pompeian style, with birds and festoons on a red ground. Here is the well, the drinking-fountain, the washing-trough, and the wardrobe. On the opposite side is the _schola_, or banqueting-room, with benches on three sides. There is no doubt that the builders and owners of these crypts were Christians; because the graves within were arranged for the interment of bodies, not for cremation; that is, for sarcophagi and coffins, not for cinerary urns; and, as I stated at the beginning of the previous chapter, the pagans of the first century, and of the first half of the second, were never interred. The Domitilla after whom the catacombs were named was a niece of Vespasian, _Divi Vespasiani neptis_. The reader will remember that in