i'^. (^ JOHNM.' OLIN ,, LIBRARY'S/ CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 1924 074 296 439 The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924074296439 Jji^ LATACOMBS of JVOiYiE, AND THEIR TESTIMONY RELATIVE TO PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANITY. BY THE REV. W. H. \yiTHROW, M. A. '^'I- '\ AQ^^M] Vf.KX.QVF. ADVEBSI'S T'VIVER'^A'^ II.Kr.KSKS -MM IIINC VR-R-TUDICATUM SIT; ID F-SSE VtRL"M, QUOUCUNQlfE PRIMCM; ID ESSE ADI'LTERUM. QUODCL'N'QTTK TOSTKRIUS. — Tertult.ian, adv. Praxptni. NEW YORK: NELSON & FHILLIFS. CIXCIN'XATI: HITCHCOCK A WALDEN. 1874. [Af.L Rights Res: rvfd.] i\ \ < ' Entered according to Act of Conejress, in the year 1874, by XEL^OJi i& PHILLIPS, in tlie Office of the Librarian of Coni^ress at Wushington. REV. JOHN M^CAUL, LL.D.. rr.ESIDEXT OF UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, TORONTO, CANADA, ONE OF THE MOST EMINENT OF LU'INO EPICaAPIIISTS : IN' ADMIRA.TION OF HIS DISTINGUISHED SCHOLARSHir, AS A TRIBUTE OF rEREONAI. ESTEEM, ^his Booh IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY" TilE AUTHOR. PREFACE. The present work, it is hoped, will supply a want long felt in the literature of the Catacombs. That litera- ture, it is true, is very voluminous ; but it is for the most part locked up in rare and costly folios in foreign languages, and inaccessible to the general reader. Recent discoveries have refuted some of the theories and corrected many of the statements of previous books in English on this subject ; and the present vol- ume is the only one in which the latest results of ' exploration are fully given, and interpreted from a Protestant point of view. The writer has endeavored to illustrate the subject by frequent pagan sepulchral inscriptions, and by citations from the writings of the Fathers, which often throw much light on the condition of early Christian society. The value of the work is greatly , enhanced, it is thought, by the addition of many hundreds of early Christian inscriptions carefully translated, a very large proportion of which have never before appeared in English. Those only who have given some attention to epigraphical studies can conceive the difficulty of this part of the work. The de- facements of time, and frequently the original imper- fection of the inscriptions and the ignorance of their 6 Preface. writers, demand the utmost carefulness to avoid errors of interpretation. The writer has been fortunate in being assisted by the veteran scholarship of the Rev. Dr. McCaul, well known in both Europe and America as one of the highest living authorities in epigraphical science, under whose critical revision most of the translations have passed. Through the enterprise of the publishers this work is more copi- ously illustrated, from original and other sources, than any other work on the subject in the language ; thus giving more correct and vivid impressions of the un- familiar scenes and objects delineated than is possi- ble by any mere verbal description. References are given, in the foot-notes, to the principal authorities quoted, but specific acknowledgment should here be made of the author's indebtedness to the Cavaliere De Rossi's Roma Sutterranea and Iiiscriptiones Chris- tiancB, by far the most important works on this fas- cinating but difficult subject. Believing that the testimony of the Catacombs exhibits, more strikingly than any other evidence, the immense contrast between primitive Christianity and modern Romanism, the author thinks no apology necessary for the somewhat polemical character of portions of this book which illustrate that fact. He trusts that it will be found a contribution of some value to the historical defense of the truth against the corruptions and innovations of Popish error. New York, 1874, CONTENTS, looh Jfirsi. THE STRUCTURE AND HISTORY OF THE CATACOMBS. Chaptek Pabk I. The Structure of the Catacombs ii II. The Origin and Early History of the Catacombs. 49 III. The Disuse and Abandonment of the Catacombs. 120 IV. The Rediscovery and Exploration of the Cata- combs 150 V. The Principal Catacombs 164 THE ART AND SYMBOLISM OF THE CATACOMBS. I. Early Christian Art 203 II. The Symbolism of the Catacombs 225 III. The Biblical Paintings of the Catacombs 282 IV. Objects found in the Catacombs 362 THE INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CATACOMBS. I. General Character of the Inscriptions 395 II. The Doctrinal Teachings of the Inscriptions... 415 III. Early Christian Life and Character as read in the Catacombs 453 IV. Ministry, Rites, and Institutions of the Primitive Church as Indicated in the Catacombs 506 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Fig. Page 1. Entrance to Catacomb of St. Priscilla 12 2. Entrance to Catacomb of St. Prtetextatus i5 3. Part of Callixtan Cata- comb 17 4. Gallery with Tombs. ... i3 5. Interior of Corridor 20 6. Loculi — Open and Closed 23 7. Tomb of Valeria 24 8. Arcosolium with Perfo- rated Slab 25 9. Plan of Double Chamber. 26 10. Section of Gallery and Cubicula 27 11. Suite of Chambers 28 12. Vaulted Chamber with Columns 29 13. Cubiculum with Arcoso- lia 30 14. Section of Catacomb of Callixtus 32 15. Cubicula with Luminare. 35 16. Galleiy in St. Hermes . . 42 17. Part of Wall of Gallery in St. Plermes 42 18. Slab in Jewislr Catacomb. 51 19. Epitaph of Martyrus.. . . 66 20. Reputed Martyr Symbol. 77 21. Epitaph of Lannus, a Martyr 98 22. Secret Stairway in Cata- comb of Callixtus. . . . loi 23. Diogenes the Fossor. . . . 133 24. Kessor at Work 134 Fig. Pago 25. Tombs on Appian Way. 165 26. Plan of Area in Callixtan Catacomb 171 27. Plan of Crypt of St. Peter and St. Paul 187 28. Crypt of St. Peter and St. Paul 188 29. Section of Catacomb of Helena 191 30. Entrance to Catacomb of St. Agnes 195 31. Mjthraic Painting 216 32. Leaf Point 227 33. Phonetic Symbol — Leo.. 229 34. Phonetic Symbol — Por- cella 230 35. Phonetic Symbol — Na- bira 23Q 36. Wool-comber's Imple- ments 231 37. Carpenter's Implements. 231 38. Vine Dresser's Tomb .. . 232 39. Symbolical Anchor 234 40. Symbolical Ship 235 41. Symbolical Palm and Crown 236 42. Symbolical Doves 237 43. Symbolical Dove 238 44. Doves and Vase 238 45. Locus Primi 23S 46. Symbolical Peacock 240 47. The Good Shepherd. . . . 245 48. Good Shepherd with Syrinx 246 49. Symbolical Lamb 249 List of Ilhcstrations. Fis. Pilge 50. Symbolical P'ish 255 51. Symbolical Fish 256 52. Fish and Anchor 256 53. Fish and Dove 256 54. Eucharistic Symbol 256 55. Constantinian Monogram 265 56. Early Christian Seal.... 266 57. Various Forms of Mono- gram 267 5S. Epitaph of Tasaris 267 59. OpisthographK 26S 60. Early Christian Seal, . . , 270 61. Monogram and Cross. . . 270 62. The Temptation and Fall 284 63. Adam and Eve Receiving their Sentence 285 64. Noah in the Ark 2S6 65. Xoah in the Ark. .... . 287 66. Xoah in the Ark, from Sarcophagus 2S7 67. Apamean Medal 2SS 68. Sacrifice of Isaac 2S9 69. Sacrifice of Isaac 289 70. Moses on Horeb 290 71. Mcses Receiving the I^aw 290 72. Moses and the Baskets of Manna 2gi 73. Moses Striking the Rock 291 74. Moses Striking the Rock 291 75. The Sufferings of Job.. . 293 76. Ascension of Elijah 295 77. The Three Hebrew Chil- dren 296 78. The Three Hebrew Chil- dren 297 79. The Three Hebrew Chil- dren 298 80. Daniel in the Lions' Den 299 81. The Story of Jonah 300 82. Jonah, Moses, and Oranti 301 S3. Jonah and the Great Fish. 302 34. Noah and Jonah 302 Fis Pase 85. Jonah's Gourd 304 86. Adoration of Magi. . . . 305 87. Adoration of Magi. . . . 306 88. Orante 309 8g. Supposed Madonna ... 311 90. Earliest Madonna 312 91. Christ with the Doctors. 324 92. Christ and the Woman of Samaria 325 93. Paralytic Carr)dng Bed. 325 94. Woman with Issue of Blood 326 95. Miracle of Loaves and Fishes 327 96. Opening the Eyes of the Blind 327 97. Christ Blessing a Little Child 32S 98. Lazarus (rude) 330 99. Lazarus (in fresco) 330 100. Lazarus (in relief) 331 101. Christ's Entry into Jeru- salem 33 T 102. Peter's Denial of Christ. 332 103. Pilate Washing his Hands 333 104. Sculptured Sarcophagus 334 105. Painted Chamber 339 106. Oldest Extant Head of Christ (mosaic) 347 107. God Symbolized by a Hand 356 108. God as Pope 359 109. Domestic Group in Gilt Glass 366 no. Reputed Martyr Relic. 371 111. Reputed Martyr Sym- bol 374 112. Symbolical Lamp 377 113. Symbolical Lamp 378 114. Vases from the Cata- combs 381 lO List of Illiistraticnis. Fig. Page 115. Amphora from the Cat- acombs 382 116. Earthen and Metal Ves- sels 3S3 117. Early Christian Ring.. 385 118. Early Christian Seal... 3S5 119. Impressions of Seals. . . 386 120. Children's Toys 3S7 121. Statue of Good Shep- herd 3go 122. Epitaph of Gemella.. . 401 123. Epitaph of Ligiirius Successus 402 FiK- Page 124. Epitaph of Domitius.. 402 125. Epitaph Inverted 404 126. Epitaph Reversed 404 127. Epitaph of Cassta 405 12S. Triple Epitaph 405 129. Belicia 500 130. Chamber with Catechu- mens' Seats 531 131. Baptismal Font 537 132. Baptism of Our Lord. . 538 133. Baptismal Scene 539 134. Fresco of Early Chris- tian Agape 546 THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. BOOK FIRST. STRUCTURE AND HISTORY OF THE CATACOMBS. CHAPTER I. STRUCTURE OF THE CATACOMBS. " Among the cultivated grounds not far from the city of Rome," says the Christian poet Prudentius, "lies a deep crypt, with dark recesses. A descending path, with winding steps, leads through the dim turnings, and the daylight, entering by the mouth of the cavern, somewhat illumines the first part of the way. But the darkness grows deeper as we advance, till we meet with openings, cut in the roof of the passages, admitting light from above. On all sides spreads the densely-woven labyrinth of paths, branching into caverned chapels and sepulchral halls ; and throughout the subterranean maze, through frequent openings, penetrates the light."* * Haud procul extremo culta ad pomoeria vallo, Mersa latebrosis crypta patet foveis. . . . — Peristephanon, iv. The origin of the word Catacombs is exceedingly obscure. Father Marchi derives it from Kara, down, and rvfifSot;, a tomb ; or from Kara and Koifiiia, to sleep. Mommsen thinks it comes from Kara and cnmbo, ^3.-!ta{ decumbo, to lie down. According to Schneider (Lex. 12 The Calacoinbs of Roiiic. 1 - A^'i-'i^^ - -f^r,' ^ Pig. 1.— Entrancs to tli3 Catacomb of St. Priscilla. This description of the Catacombs in the fourth cen- tary is equally applicable to their general appearance in the nineteenth. Their main features are unchanged, although time and decay have greatly impaired their structure and defaced their beauty. (Fhese Christian cemeteries are situated chiefly near the great roads leading from the city, and, for the most part, within a circle of three- miles from the walls. jFrom this circum- stance they have been compared to the " encampment of a Christian host besieging Pagan Rome, and driving inward its mines and trenches with an assurance of Grcsk.) it is derived from (caru and Kv/iSy, a boat or canoe, from the resemblance of a. sarcophagus to that object. The more probable derivation seems to the present writer to be from Kara and kvuioc, a hollow, as if descriptive of a subterranean excavation. The name was first given in the sixth century to a limited area beneath the ChurchofSt. Sebastian : " Locus qui dicittir catacuiiibasy — S. Greg., 0pp., tom. ii, ep. 30. It was afterward generlcally applied to all sub- terranean places of sepulture. The earliest writers who mention those of Rome call them cryptix, or crypts, or crvmetei-ia — ; whence our word cemetery, literally, sleeping places, from Kotfidu, to slumber. Similar excavations have been found in Syria, Asia Minor, Cyprus, Crete, the ^gean Isles, Greece, Sicily, Naples, Malta, and France, Tkcir Stnicture. 1 3 final victory." The openings of the Catacombs are scattered over the Campagna, whose mournful desolation surrounds the city ; often among the mouldering mau- solea that rise, like stranded wrecks, above the rolling sea of verdure of the tomb-abounding plain.* On every side are tombs — tombs above and tombs be- low — the graves of contending races, the sepulchres of vanished generations : ^'Fiena di sepoltura e la Cam- pagna." \ How marvelous that beneath the remains of a proud pagan civilization exist the early monuments of that power before which the myths of paganism faded away as the spectres of darkness before the rising sun, and by which the religion and institutions of Rome were entirely changed. J Beneath the ruined palaces and temples, the crumbling tombs and dismantled villas, of the august mistress of the world, we find the most interesting relics of early Christianity on the face of the earth. In trav- ersing these tangled labyrinths we are brought face to face with the primitive ages ; we are present at the worship of the infant Church ; we observe its rites ; we study its institutions ; we witness the deep emotions of the first believers as they commit their dead, often * Tliese great roads for miles are lined with the sepulchral monu- ments of Rome's mighty dead, majestic e>2n in decay. But only the wealthy could be entombed in those stately mausolea, or be wrapped in those "marble cerements." For the mass of the population co- htvibaria were provided, in whose narrow niches, like the compart- ments of a dove-cote — whence the name — the terra cotta urns con- taining their ashes were placed, sometimes to the number of six thou- sand in a single columbarittTn. They also contain sometimes the urns of the great. t Ariosto, Orlando Fitrioso. \ Aringhi, in the elegant Latin ode prefixed to his great work, ex- claims, " Siib Rjina Romaui qurcrito^'' — Berieath Rome I seek ths true Rome. 14 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. their martyred dead, to their last long resting-place ; we decipher the touching record of their sorrow, of the holy hopes by which they were sustained, of " their faith triumphant o'er their fears," and of their assurance of the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting. We read in the testimony of the Catacombs the confession of faith of the early Christians, sometimes accompanied by the records of their persecution, the symbols of their martyrdom, and even the very instru- ments of their torture. For in these halls of silence and gloom slumbers the dust of many of the martyrs and confessors, who sealed their testimony with their blood during the sanguinary ages of persecution ; of many of the early bishops and pastors of the Church, who shepherded the flock of Christ amid the dangers of those troublous times ; of many who heard the words of life from teachers who lived in or near the apostolic age, perhaps from the lips of the apostles themselves. Indeed, if we would accept ancient tradition, we would even believe that the bodies of St. Peter and St. Paul were laid to rest in those hallowed crypts — a true terra sancta, inferior in sacred interest only to that rock-hewn sepulchre consecrated evermore by the body of Our Lord. These reflections will lend to the study of the Catacombs an interest of the highest and intensest character. It is impossible to discover with exactness the extent of this vast necropolis on account of the number and intricacy of its tangled passages. That extent has been greatly exaggerated, however, by the monkish ciceroni, who guide visitors through these subterranean labyrinths.* There are some forty-two of these ceme- * Even so accurate and philosophical a writer as the late Professor Silliman reports on their authority that tiie Catacombs extend twenty Tlieir Structure. 1 5 teries in all now known, many of which are only par- tially accessible. Signor Michele De Rossi, from an accurate survey of the Catacomb of Callixtus, computes the entire length of all the passages to be eight hundred and seventy-six thousand metres, or five hundred and eighty-seven geographical miles, equal to the entire length of Italy, from Etna's fires to the Alpine snows. The entrance to the abandoned Catacomb is some- times a low-browed aperture like a fox's burrow, almost concealed by long and tangled grass, and overshadowed by the melancholy cypress or gray-leaved ilex. Some- times an ancient arch can be discerned, as at the Cata- comb of St. Priscilla,* or the remains of the chamber for the celebration of the festivals of the martyrs, as at the entrance of the Cemetery of St. Domitilla. In a few in- stances it is through the crypts of an ancient basilica, as at St. Sebastian, and sometimes a little shrine or oratory covers the descent, as at St. Agnes, t St. Helena, % and St. Cyriaca. In all cases there is a stairway, often long and steep, crumbling with time and worn with the feet of pious generations. The following illustration shows the entrance to the Catacomb of St. Prsetextatus on the Appian Way, trodden in the primitive ages by the early martyrs and confessors, or perhaps by the armed sol- diery of the oppressors, hunting to earth the persecuted flock of Christ. Here, too, in mediaeval times, the miles, to the port of Ostia, in one direction, and to Albano, twelve miles, in another. Visit to Europe, vol. i, p. 329. This is impossible, as will be shown, on account of the undulation of the ground, and the limited area of the volcanic Utfa in which alone they can be excavated. The number of distinct Catacombs has als in Peace, Rossi states that he has assisted at the removal of a body from the Catacombs to a church two miles distant with- out the displacement of a single bone.* The age of the deceased and the nature of the ground also affect the condition in which the remains are found. Of the bodies of children nothing but dust remains. Where the poz- zolana is damp, the bones are often well preserved ; and where water has infiltrated, a partial petrifaction some- times occurs.f Campana describes the opening of a hermetically sealed sarcophagus, which revealed the undisturbed body clad in funeral robes, and wearing the ornaments of life ; but while he gazed it suddenly dis- solved to dust before his eyes. Sometimes the sarcoph- agus was placed behind a perforated slab of marble, as shown in the following example, given by Maitland. The lower part of the slab is broken. The other essential constituent of the Catacombs, besides the galleries already described, consists of the aibicnla.X These are chambers excavated in the tufa " Rom. Soft., ii, 127. t D'Agincourt, Histoire de tart par les Montimetis, i, 20. \ Literally, little sleeping cliambers, from aibo, I lie clown. Tlie same name was also given to the cells for meditation and prayer at- tached to the Church of Nola. Paulin., ep. 12, ad Sever. Their Structure. 25 Fig. 8.— Arcosolium ■with Perforated Slab. on either side of the galleries, with which they commu- nicate by doors, as seen in Fig. 4. These often bear the character of family vaults, and are lined with graves, like the corridors without. They are generally square or rectangular, but sometimes octagonal or circular. They were probably used as mortuary chapels, for the celebration of funeral service, and for the administra- tion of the eucharist near the tombs of the martyrs on the anniversaries of their death. They were too small to be used for regular worship, except perhaps in time of persecution. They are often not more than eight or ten feet square. Even the so-called " Papal Crypt," a chamber of peculiar sanctity, is only eleven by fourteen 26 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. feet ; and that of St. Cecilia a d j o i n i n g it, one of a large size, is less than twenty feet square. Even the largest would not ac- commodate more than a few dozen per- s o n s. These chambers are generally fac- ing one anoth- er on opposite sides of a gal- lery, as in the annexed plan of two cubicida in the Cata- comb of Cal- li.xtus. It is thought that in the cel- eb rati on of worship one of these chambers was designed for men and the other for women. Sometimes separate passages to the chapels and distinct entrances to the Catacombs seem intended to facilitate this separation of the sexes. Sometimes three, or even as many as five, cubicula, as in one example in the Catacomb of St. Agnes, were placed on the same Fig. 9.— Plan of Double Chamber. Their Structure. 27 axial line, and formed one continu- ous sjiite of chambers. The accom- panying section of what is known as " The Chapel of Two Halls," in the Catacomb of St. Praetextatus, il- lustrates this : A is the main gallery, D a large ciibiculum known as " The Women's Hall," to the right, and to the left B, a hexagonal vaulted room with a smaller chamber, c opening from it. The length of the entire range from g to f, according to the accurate measurement of M. Perret, is twenty-three and a half mitres, or nearly seventy-seven feet. The larger engraving (Fig. 11) gives a perspective view look- ing toward the left of the hexagonal chamber,(D. Fig. 10,) and the smaller one, c, opening from it By means of these connected chambers the Christians were enabled in times of persecution to assemble for wor- ship in these "dens -and caves of the earth," surrounded by the slum- bering bodies of the holy dead. The ciibicula had vaulted roofs, and were sometimes plastered or cased with marble and paved with tiles, or, though rarely, with mosaic. These, however, were gen- erally additions of later date than the original construc- tion, as were also the semi-detached columns in the angles, with stucco capitals and bases, as indicated in Fig. 9, and shown more clearly in the following engrav- ing, which is a perspective view of the lower chamber 28 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. TItcir Structure. Fig-. 12.— Vaulted Chamber with Columns. in Fig. 9. The walls and ceiling were often covered with fresco paintings, frequently of elegant design, to be hereafter described.* Sometimes, as in some examples in the Catacomb of St. Agnes, tufa or marble seats are ranged around the chamber, and chairs are hewn out of the solid rock.f These chambers were used probably for the instruction of catechumens. Occasionally the cicbiculum terminates in a semicircular recess, as in the upper chamber in Fig. 9. These probably gave rise to the apse in early Christian architecture, of which a good example is found in the Church of St. Clement, one of the most ancient Christian edifices in Rome. Niches and shelves for lamps, an absolute necessity in the per- petual darkness that there reigns, frequently occur, such as may be seen in Italian houses to-day. Without the least authority, some Roman Catholic writers have de- * Book II. f See Fig. 130 and context, where the entire subject is discussei 30 The Catacombs of Rome. scribed these as closets for priestly -vestments and shelves for pictures. A peculiar form of grave common in these chambers, as well as in the galleries, is that known as the arcosoliiim, or arched tomb. It consists of a recess in the wall, having a grave, often double or triple, excavated in the tufa, or built with masonry, like a solid sarcophagus, and closed with a marble slab. These are seen in the plan, Fig. 9, in the Section, Fig. lo, at G and E in Fig. IS, and in perspective in Figs, u and 12. Some- times the recess is rectangular instead of arched, and is then called by De Rossi sepolcro a mensa, or table tomb. Sometimes the arch was segmental, especially when constructed of masonry.* An example of both sorts is Figr. 13.— Cubioulum with Arcosolia. seen in the accompanying engraving of a ciMcidiun in the Catacomb of St. Prsetextatus. The narrow door into the corridor is also seen, and the stucco capitals and bases of the columns. In course of time these arcosolia were * See in the Cemetery of St. Ilelenn, Fig. 29. Their Stnictiirc. 3r used as altars for the celebration of the eucharist, and eventually grave abuses arose from the superstitious veneration paid to the relics of the martyr or confessor interred therein. Frequently, also, the back of this arched recess was pierced with graves of a later date, often directly through a painting,* in order to obtain a resting place near the bodies of the saints. Hitherto only one level of the Catacombs has been described, but frequently " beneath this depth there is a lower deep," or even three or four tiers of galler- ies, excavated as the upper ones became filled with graves. Thus there are sometimes as many as five stories, or piani, as they are called, one beneath the other. These are carefully maintained horizontal, to avoid breaking through the floor of the one above or the roof of the one below, the danger of which would be very great if the strict level were departed from. For the same reason the different piani were generally separated by a thick stratum of solid tufa. The rela- tive position of these levels is shown by the following engraving, reduced from De Rossi. It represents a sec- tion of the Crypt of St. Lucina, a part of the Ceme- tery of Callixtus. The dark colored stratum, marked ] in the margin, is entirely made up of the debris of ancient monuments, buildings, and other materials accumulated in the course of ages in this place to the depth of eight 'cet. It has completely buried the ancient roads, except where excavated, as shown in the engraving. The next stratum, il, is of solid grayish tufa. In this the first level ox pia?w, (ji, is excavated. It is not more than twenty feet below the surface, and in many places only half that depth. Consequently its area is comparatively lim- ited, because if extended it would have run out into the * As in Fig. 12, and more striVcingly in Kig 76. 32 TIic Catacombs of Rome. Fig. 14,— Sootion of tlis Catacomb of OalUxtua. open air, from the sloping of the ground in which it ib dug. The next stratum, in, is softer and more easily worked, and therefore is that in which are found the most important and extensive piani of galleries. The cross sections P and X, and the longitudinal section u, will show how the lower surface of the more solid stra- tum above was made the ceiling of these galleries, in order to lessen the danger of its falling. At n will be observed the employment of masonry to strengthen the Their Structitre. 33 crumbling walls of the friable tufa. The descent of a few steps, some of which have been worn away, will also be noticed at u. At iv a more rocky stratum is found, called tufa lithoide, below which the ancient fossors* had to go to find suitable material for the excavation of the third piano. This «as found in stratum v, in which are two piani at different levels. The lower one is not vertically beneath that here represented above it, but at some little distance. It is here shown, to exhibit at one view a section of all the stories of this Catacomb. The upper piano, (/, consists of low and narrow galleries, but the lower one, marked r r r, seventy-one feet beneath the surface of the ground, is of great extent. Several of the loculi, it will be perceived, are built of masonry, in consequence of the crumbling nature of the soil. The three large arcosolia will also be observed. The floor of x!a\i piano rests on a somewhat firmer stratum, in which is still another level of galleries, 2 2 a, ten feet lower down. This lower level is generally subject to inundation by water, in consequence of the periodical rising of the adjacent Almone, the level of which is shown at a depth of one hundred and four feet, and that of the Tiber at one hundred and thirty-one feet, below the surface. To secure immunity from dampness, which would ac- celerate decomposition and corrupt the atmosphere, the Catacombs were generally excavated in high ground in the undulating hills around the city, never crossing the intervening depressions or valleys. There is, there- fore, no connection between the different cemeteries ex- cept where they happen to be contiguous, nor, as has been asserted, with the churches of Rome. Wiiere a * An organized body of diggers, Ijy whom tlie Catncombs were ex- cavated. See Bnol< III, diaji. iv. 34 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. Catacomb has been excavated in low ground, as in the exceptional case of that of Castulo on the Via Labicana, the water has rendered it completely inaccessible. Access to these different piani is gained by stairways, which are sometimes covered with tile or marble, or built with masonry, or by shafts. The awful silence and almost palpable darkness of these deepest dungeons is absolutely appalling. They are fitly described by the epithet applied by Dante to the realms of eternal gloom : loco d' ogni luce muto — a spot mute of all light. Here death reigns supreme. Not even so much as a lizard or a bat has penetrated these obscure recesses. Nought but skulls and skeletons, dust and ashes, are on every side. The air is impure and deadly, and difficult to breathe. " The cursed dew of the dungeon's damp " distills from the walls, and a sense of oppression, like the patriarch's " horror of great darkness," broods over the scene. The Catacombs were ventilated and partially lighted by numerous openings variously called spiragli, or breath- ing-holes, and luminari, or light-holes. They were also probably used for the removal of the excavated material from those parts remote from the entrance. They were even more necessary for the admission of air than of light. Were it not for these the number of burning lamps, the multitude of dead bodies, no matter how carefully the loculi were cemented, and the opening of bisomi, or double graves, for interments, would create an insupportable atmosphere. They were generally in the line of junction between two cubkuta, a branch of the himinare entering each chamber, as shown in the accom- panying section of a portion of the Catacomb of Sts. Marcellinus and Peter. Sometimes, indeed, four, or even more, cubicula were ventilated and partially lighted by the same shaft. De Kossi mentions one lii,iinnare '\t\ Thdr Structure. 35 Fi^. 1 5.— Section of Cubicula with Luminare, the recently discovered Cemetery of St. Balbina, which is not square but hexagonal, or nearly so, and which di- vides into eight branches, illumining as many separate chambers or galleries. Sometimes a funnel-shaped luminare reaches to the lowest piano; but from the faint rays that feebly struggle to those gloomy depths there comes " no light, but rather darkness visible." In the upper levels, however, some cubicula are well lighted by large openings. The brilliant Italian sunshine to-day lights up the pictured figures on the wall as it must have illumined with its strong Rembrandt light the fair brow of the Christian maiden, the silvery hair of the vener- able pastor, or the calm face of the holy dead waiting for interment in those early centuries so long ago. These luminari are often two feet square at the top, and wider as they descend ; sometimes they are cylindrical in shape, as in the Catacomb of St. Helena.* The external * See Fie:. 20 36 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. openings, often concealed by grass and weeds, are very numerous throughout the Campagna near the city, and are often dangerous to the unwary rider. In almost every vineyard between the Pincian and Salarian roads they may be found, and through them an entrance into the Catacombs may frequently- be effected. After the persecution had ceased, and there was no longer need for concealment, their number was increased, and they were made of a larger size, and frequently lined with masonry, or plastered and frescoed. In the Catacombs of St. Agnes and of Callixtus are several in a very good state of preservation. We have already seen the contemporary account of the Catacombs by Prudentius, in the fourth century. Jerome also describes their appearance at the same pe- riod in words which are almost equally applicable to-day. " When I was a boy, being educated at Rome," he says, " I used every Sunday, in company with others of my own age and tastes, to visit the sepulchres of the apostles and martyrs, and to go into the crypts dug in the heart of the earth. The walls on either side are lined with bodies of the dead, and so intense is the darkness as to seemingly fulfill the words of the prophet, ' They go down alive to Hades.' Here and there is light let in to mitigate the gloom. As we advance the words of the poet are brought to mind: 'Horror on all sides; the very silence fills the soul with dread.' "* It must not be supposed that the features above de- * " Dum essem Romae puer, et liberalibus studiis erudiier, soleb.im cum ca:teris ejusdem oetatis et propositi, diebus Dominicis sepulchra apostolorura et martyrum circuire, crebroqiie cryptas ingredi, quce in terrarum profunda defossae, ex utraque parte ingredientium per parietes corpora sepultorum, ... * Horror ubique aiiimos, siniiil ipsa silentia terrcnt,* '' — Ilieron. in Fzec/i., (^aji. \1. Their Structure. 37 scribed are always perfectly exhibited. They are often obscured and obliterated by the lapse of time, and by earthquakes, inundations, and other destructive agen- cies of nature. The stairways are often broken and in- terrupted, and the corridors blocked up by the falling in of the roof, where it has been carried too near the sur- face, or by the crumbling of the walls, and sometimes apparently by design during the age of persecution. The rains of a thousand winters have washed tons of earth down the luminari, destroyed the symmetry of the openings, and completely filled the galleries with debris. The natural dampness of the situation, and the smoke of the lamps of the early worshipers, or the torches of more recent visitors, and sometimes incrustations of nitre, have impaired or destroyed the beauty of many of the paintings. The hand of the spoiler has in many cases completed the work of devastation. The rifled graves and broken tablets show where piety or supersti- tion has removed the relics of the dead, or where idle curiosity has wantonly mutilated their monuments. The present extent of the Catacombs is the result, not of primary intention, but of the contact of sepa- rate areas of comparatively limited original size, and the inosculation, as it were, of their distinct galleries. This is apparent from the fact that this contact and junction sometimes take place between areas of differ- ent levels, causing a break in their horizontal continuity, like the "faults" or dislocations common in geological strata. Sometimes, too, this junction between two ad- jacent areas takes place through a tier of graves, and evidently formed no part of the original design. These separate areas were originally, as we shall see in the following chapter, private burial places in the vine- yards of wealthy Christian converts, and were early 38 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. made available for the interment of the poorer members of the infant Church. In accordance with a common Roman usage the ground thus set apart for the purpose of sepulture was placed under the protection of the law, and was accurately defined, to secure it from trespass or violation. While the protection of the law was en- joyed, the excavations were strictly confined within the limits of these areas, and lower piatii were dug rather than transgress the boundary. But when that protection was withdrawn the galleries were horizontally extended, often for the purpose of facilitating escape, and connec- tions were made with adjacent areas, till the whole be- came an intricate labyrinth of passages and chambers. These areas are still further distinguished by certain peculiarities in the inscriptions, aibicula, and paintings, and were greatly modified by subsequent constructions. It has till recently been thought that the Catacombs were originally excavations made by the Romans for the extraction of sand and other building material, and afterward adopted by the Christians as places of refuge, and eventually of sepulture and worship. This opinion was founded on a few misunderstood classical allusions and statements in ancient ecclesiastial writers, and on a misinterpretation of certain accidental features of the Catacombs themselves. It was held, nevertheless, by such eminent authorities as Baronius, Severano, Aringhi, Bottari, D'Agincourt, and Raoul-Rochette. Padre Marchi first rejected this theory of construction, and the brothers De Rossi have completely refuted it. An examination of the material in which these sand pits and stone quarries and the Catacombs were respect- ively excavated, as well as of their structural differ- ences, will show their entirely distinct character. The surface of the Campagna, especially of that part Their Stiucture. 39 occupied by the Catacombs, is almost exclusively of vol- canic origin. The most ancient and lowest stratum of this igneous formation is a compact conglomerate known as tufa litlwide. It was extensively quarried for build- ing, and the massive blocks of the Cloaca Maxima and the ancient wall of Romulus attest the durability of its character. Upon this rest stratified beds of volcanic ashes, pumice, and scoria, often consolidated with water, but of a substance much less firm than that of the tufa litlioide, and called tufa gratiolare. In insulated beds, rarely of considerable extent, in this latter formation, occurs another material, known as pozzolana. It con- sists of volcanic ashes deposited on dry land, and still existing in an unconsolidated condition. This is the ma- terial of the celebrated Roman cement, which holds together to this day the massy structures of ancient Rome. It was conveyed for building purposes as far as Constantinople, and the pier on the Tiber from which it was shipped is still called the Porto di Pozzolana. It is in these latter deposits exclusively that the arenaria, or sand pits, are found. The tufa graiwlare is too firm, and contains too large a proportion of earth, to use as sand, and is yet too friable for building purposes. Yet it is in this material, entirely worthless for any eco- nomic use, that the Catacombs are almost exclusively ex- cavated ; while the tufa litlwide and the pozzolana are both carefully avoided where possible, the one as too hard and the other as too soft for purposes of Christian sepulture. Sometimes, indeed, as at the cemeteries of St. Pontianus and St. Valentinus, for special reasons. Catacombs were excavated in less suitable material ; but still the substance removed — a shelly marl — was economically useless, and the galleries had to be sup- ported by solid masonry. The tufa granolare, on the 40 The Catacombs of Rome. contrary, was admirably adapted for the construction of these subterranean cemeteries. It could be easily dug with a mattock, yet was firm enough to be hollowed into loadi and chambers ; and its porous character made the chambers dry and wholesome for purposes of assem- bly, which was of the utmost importance in view of the vast number of bodies interred in these recesses. The differences of structure between the quarries or arenaria and the Catacombs are no less striking. To this day, the vast grottoes from which the material for the building of the Coliseum was hewn, most probably by the Jewish prisoners of Titus, may still be seen on the Coelian hill. It is said that in those gloomy vaults were kept the fierce Numidian lions and leopards whose conflicts with the Christian martyrs furnished the savage pastime of the Roman amphitheatre. But noth- ing can less resemble the narrow and winding passages of the Catacombs than those tremendous caverns. Nor is there any greater resemblance in the excava- tions of the arenaria. These are large and lofty vaults, from sixteen to twenty feet wide, the arch of which often springs directly from the floor, so as to give the largest amount of sand with the least labour of excava- tion. The object was to remove as much material as possible ; hence there was often only enough left to sup- port the roof. The spacious passages of the arenaria run in curved lines, avoiding sharp angles, ?o as to allow the free passage of the carts which carried away the excavated sand. In the Catacombs, on the contrary, as little material as possible was removed ; hence the e;alleries are generally not more than three, or some- times only two, feet wide, and run for the most part in straight lines, often crossing each other at quite acute angles, so that only very narrow carts can be used iu Their Structure. 41 cleaning out the accumulated debris of centuries — a very tedious process, which greatly increases the cost of exploration. The walls, moreover, are always vertical, and the roof sometimes quite flat, or only slightly arched. The wide difference in the principle of construction is obvious. The great object in the Catacombs has been to obtain the maximum of wall-surface, for the inter- ment of the dead in the loaili with which the galleries are lined throughout, with the minimum of excavation. The structural difference will at once be seen by com- paring the irregular windings of the small arenarium represented in the upper part of Figs. 3 and 26 with the straight and symmetrical galleries of the adjacent Catacomb. Connected with the Catacomb of St. Agnes is an extensive arenarium, whose spacious, grotto-like appearance is very different from that of the narrow se- pulchral galleries beneath. In the floor of this arenarium is a square shaft leading to the Catacomb, in which Dr. Northcote conjectures there was formerly a wind- lass for removing the excavated material. There are also footholes, for climbing the sides of the shaft, cut in the solid tufa, perhaps as a means of escape in the time of persecution. This arenarium, which was probably worked out and abandoned long before its connection with the Catacomb, may have been employed as a masked entrance to its crypts, when the more public one could not be safely used. Its spacious vaults may also have been a receptacle for the broken tufa removed from the galleries beneath. Many of these arenaria may be observed excavated in the hill-sides near Rome ; but except when incident- ally forming part of a Catacomb, they have never been found to contain a single grave. Indeed, in conse- quence of the utter unfitness of the pozzolana for the 4^ The Catacombs of Rome. purposes of Christian sepulture, the intrusion of a de- posit of that material into the area of a Catacomb pre- vented the extension or necessitated the diversion of its galleries. Moreover, where the attempt has been made to convert an arenarium into a Christian cemetery, the changes which have been made show conclusively its original unfitness for the latter purpose. The accom- panying section of a gallery in the Catacomb of St. Hermes will exhibit the structural ad- ditions necessary to adopt an arenarium for Christian sep- ulture. The sides of the semi-eliptical vault had to be built up with brick-work, leaving only a narrow passage Fig. 16.-Gallery in St. Hermes. j^ jj^e middle. The locidi were spaces left in the masonry, in which the mouldering skeletons may still be seen. The openings were closed with slabs in the usual manner, as shown in Fig. 17.— Part of Wall of Gallery in SI. Hermes. the elevation, (Fig. 17,) except at the top, where they cover the grave obliquely, like the roof of a house. The vault is often arched with brick-work, and at the Their Structure. 43 intersection of the galleries has sometimes to be sup- ported by a solid pier of masonry. In part of an an- cient arenarium converted into a cemetery in the Cata- comb of St. Priscilla similar constructions may be seen. The long walls and numerous pillars of brick-work concealing and sustaining the tufa, and the irregular windings of the passages, show at once the vast differ- ence between the arenarium and the Catacomb, and the immense labour and expense required to convert the former into the latter. It has been urged in objection to this theory, that the difficulty of secretly disposing of at least a hundred millions of cubic feet of refuse material taken from the Catacombs must have been exceedingly great, unless it could be removed under cover of employment for some economic purpose. It will be shown, however, that secrecy was not always necessary, as has been assumed, but that, on the contrary, the Christian right of sepulture was for a long time legally recognized by the Pagan Emperors ; and that the Catacombs continued to be publicly used for a considerable time after the establish- ment of Christianity on the throne of the C^sars. Dur- ing the exacerbations of persecution there is evidence that the excavated material was deposited in the gal- eries already filled with graves, or, as we have seen, in the spacious vaults of adjacent araiaria. If the Cata- combs were merely excavations for sand or stone, as has been asserted, we ought to find many of their narrow galleries destitute of tombs, and many of the arenaria containing them ; whereas every yard of the former is occupied with graves, and not a single grave is found in the latter, nor do they contain a single example of a mural painting or inscription. The conclusion is irresist- ible that the Catacombs proper were created exclusively 44 The Catacoinbs of Rome. for the purpose of Christian burial, and in no case were of Pagan construction. The erroneous theory here combated has arisen, as we have said, chiefly from certain classical allusions to the arenaria, and from passages in the ancient ecclesi- astical records describing the burial places of the mar- tyrs, as in cryptis are/iariis, in arenaria, or ad arenas. Some of these localities, however, have been identified beyond question, and found to consist merely of a sandy kind of rock, and not at all of the true pozzolana. In others a vein oi pozzolana does actually occur in the Catacombs, or they are connected with ancient arenaria, as at St. Agnes and at Calixtus. In the other instances the localities are either yet unrecognized, or the expression merely implies that the cemetery was near the sand pits — juxta arenarium, or in loco qui dicitur ad Arenas. The mere technical description of the Catacombs, however, gives no idea of the thrilling interest felt in traversing their long-drawn corridors and vaulted halls. As the pilgrim to this shrine of the primitive faith visits these chambers of silence and gloom, accompanied by a serge-clad, sandaled monk,* he seems like the Tuscan poet wandering through the realms of darkness with his shadowy guide. " Ora sen' va per un segreto calle Tra r niuro della terra." f His footsteps echo strangely down the distant passages and hollow vaults, dying gradually away in the solemn stillness of this valley of the shadow of death. The * Unfortunately for Protestant visitors most of the Catacombs are open for inspection only on Sunday, when the work of exploration is suspended. I " And now through narrow, gloomy paths we go, 'Twcen walls of earth and tombs." — Infcnto. Their Structure. 45 graves yawn weirdly as he passes, torch in hand. Tlie flame struggles feebly with the thickening darkness, vaguely revealing the unfleshed skeletons on either side, till its redness fades to sickly white, like thoX Jioco lume,* that pale light, by which Dante saw the crowding ghosts upon the shores of Acheron. Deep mysterious shadows crouch around, and the dim perspective, lined with the sepuchral niches of the silent community of the dead, stretch on in an apparently unending vista. The very air seems oppressive and stifling, and laden with the dry dust of death. The vast extent and population of this great necropolis overwhelm the imagination, and bring to mind Petrarch's melancholy line — " Plena di morti tutta la campagna." f Almost appalling in its awe and solemnity is the sud- den transition from the busy city of the living to the silent city of the dead ; from the golden glory of the Italian sunlight to the funereal gloom of these sombre vaults. The sacred influence of the place subdues the soul to tender emotions. The fading pictures on the walls and the pious epitaphs of the departed breathe on every side an atmosphere of faith and hope, and awaken a sense of spiritual kinship that overleaps the intervening centuries. We speak with bated breath and in whispered tones, and thought is busy with the past. It is impossible not to feel strangely moved while gazing on the crumbling relics of mortality committed ages ago, with pious care and many tears, to their last, long rest. " It seems as if we had the sleepers known." | **'Com' io discerno per lo fioco lume." — [nferno. t '* Full of tlie deid this far cxtentlintj field." 46 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. We see the mother, the while her heart is wrung uith anguish, laying on its stony bed — rude couch for such a tender thing — the little form that she had cherished in her warm embrace. We behold the persecuted flock following, it may be, the mangled remains of the faith- ful pastor and valiant martyr for the truth, which at the risk of their lives they have stealthily gathered at dead of night. With holy hymns,* broken by their sobs, they commit his mutilated body to the grave, where after life's long toil he sleepeth well. We hear the Christian chant, the funeral plaint, the pleading tones of prayer, and the words of holy consolation and of lofty hope with which the dead in Christ are laid to rest. A mo- ment, and — the spell is broken, the past has vanished, and stern reality becomes again a presence. Ruin and desolation and decay are all around. The exploration of these worse than Dsdalian laby- rinths is not unattended with danger. That intrepid investigator, Bosio, was several times well nigh lost in their mysterious depths. That disaster really happened to M. Roberts, a young French artist, whose adventure has been wrought into an exciting scene in Hans Andersen's tale, "The Improvisatore," and forms an episode in the Abbe de Lille's poem, ''^ L' Imagination." Inspired by the enthusiasm of his profession, he attempted to ex- plore one of the Catacombs, with nothing but a torch and a thread for a guide. As he wandered on through gallery and chamber, he became so absorbed in his study that, unawares, the thread slipped from his hand. On discovering his loss he tried, but in vain, to recover the clew. Presently his torch went out, and he was left in utter darkness, imprisoned in a living grave, surrounded by the relics of mortality. The silence was oppressive. * Hymnos et psalmos 'lerantans. — Hieron., Vit. Pauli. Their Structure. 47 He shouted, but the hollow echoes mocked his voice. Weary with fruitless efforts to escape his dread impris- onment he threw himself in despair upon the earth, when, lo, something familiar touched his hand. Could he believe it.? it was indeed the long lost clew by which alone he could obtain deliverance from this awful labyrinth. Carefully following the precious thread he reached at last the open air, And never Tiber, rippling through the meads. Made music half so sweet among its reeds; And never had the earth such rich perfume, As when from him it chased the odor of the tomb.* Still more terrible in its wildness is an incident nar- rated by MacFarlane.f In the year 1798, after the re- turn to Rome of the Republican army under Berthier, a party of French officers, atheistic disciples of Voltaire and Rousseau, and hardened by the orgies of the Revo- lution, visited the Catacombs. They caroused in the sepulchial crypts, and sang their bacchanalian songs among the Christian dead. They rifled the graves and committed sacrilege at the tombs of the saints. One of the number, a reckless young cavalry officer, " who feared not God nor devil, for he believed in neither," re- solved to explore the remoter galleries. He was speedily lost, and was abandoned by his companions. His excited imagination' heighiened the natural horrors of the scene. The grim and ghastly skeletons seemed an army of accusing spectres. Down the long corridors the wind mysteriously whispered, rising in inarticulate moanings and woeful sighs, as of souls in pain. The tones of the neighbouring convent bell, echoing through the stony * From •• V Imagination!' by Abbe de Lille, MacFarlane's trans- lation. f Catacombs of Ranie, London, TS52. P. 94, et seq. 48 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. \'aults, sounded loud and awful as the knell of doom. Groping blindly in the dark, he touched nothing but rocky walls or mouldering bones, that sent a thrill of Inrror through his frame. Though but a thin roof sepa- rated him from the bright sunshine and free air, he seemed condemned to living burial. His philosophical skepticism failed him in this hour of peril. He could no longer scoff at death as " tin somnteil eterneL" The palimpsest of memory recalled with intensest vividness the Christian teachings of his childhood. His soul be- came filled and penetrated with a solemn awe. His physical powers gave way beneath the intensity of his emotion. He was rescued the next day, but was long ill. He rose from his bed an altered man. His life was thenceforth serious and devout. When killed in battle in Calabria seven years after, a copy of the Gospels was found next to his heart. Even as late as 1837 a party of students with their professor, numbering in all some sixteen, or, as some say. nearly thirty, entered the Catacombs on a holiday excur- sion, to investigate their antiquities, but became entangled amid their intricacies. Diligent search was made, but no trace of them was ever found. In some silent crypt or darksome corridor they were slowly overtaken by the same torturing fate as that of Ugolino and his sons in the Hunger Tower of Pisa.* The passage by which they entered has been walled up, biit the mystery of their fate will never be dispelled till the secrets of the grave shall be revealed. * Inferno, Canto xxxiii, vv. 21-75. Their Origin and Early History. 49 CHAPTER II. THE ORIGIN AND EARLY HISTORY OF THE CATACOMBS. It is highly probable that the first Roman Catacombs were excavated by the Jews.* Many Hebrew cap- tives graced the triumph of Pompey after his Syrian conquests, B. C. 62. The Jewish population increased by further voluntary accessions. They soon swarmed in that Trans-Tiberine region which formed the ancient Ghetto of Rome. They made many proselytes from paganism to the worship of the true God, and thus, to use the language of Seneca, " The conquered gave laws to their conquerors." f All the national customs and prejudices of the Jews were opposed to the Roman practice of burning the dead, which Tacitus asserts they never observed ; % and they clung with tenacity to their hereditary mode of sepul- ture. Wherever they have dwelt they have left traces * A deal of fanciful theory has been indulged in as to the origin of the Catacombs. They have been attributed to a pre-historic race of Troglodytes, who loathed the light of day, and burrowed like moles in the earth. Mac Farlane has an eloquent apostrophe to the old Etrurians, by whom he imagined they were excavated twelve hundred years liefore the Christian era. We Iiave seen also how they were erroneously attributed to the pagan Romans. t Victoribns victi leges dedencnt. On the Tiber, the Tigris, and the Nile, this saying was strikingly verified. Vet Judaism is an e'isentially conservative, not an aggressive, religion. It was un- adapted for such wide-spread conquests as those of Christianity, or even of Mohammedism. The ancient mould of thought, having served its purpose, was broken. Judaism may be said to have died in giving birth to Christianity. X Hist., V, 5. 4 50 The Catacombs of Rome. of subterranean burial. The hills of Judea are honey- combed with sepulchral caves and galleries. Similar excavations have been found in the Jewish settlements of Asia Minor, the ^gean Isles, Sicily, and Southern Italy.* So also in Rome they sought to be separated in death, as in life, from the Gentiles among whom they dwelt. They had their Catacombs apart, in which not a single Christian or pagan inscription has been found. Bosio describes one such Catacomb, which he discov- ered on jMonte Verde, which was much more ancient than the Christian Catacomb of St. Pontianus in the same vicinity. It was of very rude construction, and contained not a single Christian monument, but numer- ous slabs bearing the seven-branched Jewish candle- stick, and one inscription on which the word CTNArSir — Synagogue — was legible. f It was situated near that Trans-Tiberine quarter of the city inhabited at the pe- riod of the Christian era by the numerous Jewish popula- tion of Rome. It cannot no-\\t, however, be identified, having been obliterated or concealed by the changes of the last two centuries. Maitland gives the following Jewish inscription from a MS. collection in Rome. The figure to the left may be a horn for replenishing the lamp with oil. The letters at the right are probably intended for the Hebrew word Qvt;', Shalom, or Peace, so com- mon in its classical equivalent upon Christian tombs. The palm branch is a Pagan as well as Jewish and Chris- tian symbol of victory. The central figure is a rude repre- • In 1853 a Jewish Catacomb was discovered at Venosa, in South- ern Italy, containing one gallery seven feet high and four hundred feet long. In 1S54 another was discovered at Oria, with many Hebrew symbols and inscriptions. There were many Jews in Apulia and Calabria. ■*• In eo qiiippe haud ulla, ut in reliquis, Christianae religionis indicia et signa apparebant.-- Bosio, Rom. Sott., 142. Their Origin and Early History. 5 1 ENBAAE KEI TaI EIAHTOC AITQN A HMEP MB GAPl ABAABI NEUTEPE OYAEIC AeANATOC. Here lies Nicodemus, ruler of the Sever- enses, and beloved of all ; (aged) thirty years, forty-two days. Be of good cheer, O inoffensive young man ! no one is exempt from death. This inscription will recall another " ruler of the Synagogue" of the same name. Many of the sleep- ers in this Jewish Cemetery were evidently, from their names,* Greek or Latin proselytes. Sometimes, indeed, this is expressly asserted, as in the following : Mannacivs sorori Crysidi dvlc[ssime proselyte. — Manna- cius to his sweetest sister Chrysis, a proselyte. It may be assumed that this Catacomb was exclu- sively Jewish, and we know, from the testimony of Juvenal f and others, that numbers of the Jews inhabited the adjacent part of Rome, about the Porta Capena and the valley of Egeria. It is not, however, certain whether it is the original type, or a later imitation, of the Christian cemetery. But the Jewish population must have had extra-mural places of sepulture before the Christian era ; and it is probable that the early Jewish * See Fig. iS. t Nunc sacri fontis nimus, et delubra locantur Judccis. — Sat. iii, 13, Their Origin and Early History. 53 converts to Christianity may have merely continued a mode of burial already in vogue, substituting the em- blems of their newly adopted faith for those which they had forsaken; or, rather — for we find that they frequently retained certain Jewish symbols, as the dove, olive branch, and palm — supplementing them with the emblems of Christianity. De Rossi has ex- pressed the opinion that the earliest mode of Christian burial was in sarcophagi, as in the Jewish cemetery above described. The date of the planting of Christianity in Rome is uncertain. Probably some of the " strangers of Rome " who witnessed the miracle of the Pentecost, or, perhaps, the Gentile converts of the " Italian band " of Cornelius, brought the new evangel to their native city.* But cer- tain it is that as early as A. D. 58 the faith of the * It is incredible that the Apostle Peter had any share in planting the Roman Church. If he had, Paul would not, as he does, utterly ignore his labours. ** Only Luke is with me," writes St. Paul, just before his death ; yet he and Peter are feigned to have suffered on the same day. The story of St. Peter's twenty-five years' episcopate at Rome is too absurd to require disproof. The very minuteness of detail in the legends of St. Peter is their own refutation. In vain are we shown the chair in which tradition asserts that he sat, the .font at which he baptized, the cell in which he was confined, the fountain which sprang up in its floor, the pillar to which he was bound, the chains which he wore, the impression made by his head in the wall and by his knees in the stony pavement, the scene of his crucifixion, the very hole in which the foot of the cross was placed, and the tomb in which his body is said to lie ; they all fail to carry conviction to any mind in which superstition has not destroyed the critical faculty. The mighty fane which rises sublimely in the heart of Rome in honour of the Galilean fisherman, like the religious sys- tem of which it is the visible exponent, is founded on a shadowy tra- dition, opposed alike to the testimony of Scripture, the evidence of liistory, and the deductions of reason. The question whether Peter ever was in Rome has recently been publicly discussed under the very shadow of the Vatican. Verily, Teinpjra tuiUa/Utir. 54 The Catacombs of Rome. Roman Church was '' spoken of throughout the whole world." " Christianity," says Tertullian, " grew up un- der the shadow of the Jewish religion, to which it was regarded as akin, and about the lawfulness of which there was no question; "* and it doubtless adopted the burial usages of Judaism. But even without the example of the Jews the Ro- man Christians would naturally revolt from the pagan custom of burning the dead, with its accompanying idolatrous usages, f and would prefer burial, after the manner of their Lord. They showed a tender care for the remains of the dead, under a vivid impression of the communion of saints and the resurrection of the body. They seemed to regard the sepulchre as "God's cabinet or shrine, where he pleases to lay up the pre- cious relics of his dear saints until the jubilee of glory." J Even the Jews designated the grave as Bcth-ha-Ziaim, the "house of the living," rather than the house of the dead. It is probable, therefore, that the origin of the Christian Catacombs dates from the death of the first Roman believer in Christ. Many of the Catacombs were probably begun as * Nos qnoque ut Jvidaicre religionis propinquos, sub umbraculum insignissimoe religionis certfi licitae. — Ad jViii., i, ii. fExecrantur rogos, et damnant ignium sepulturas. — Jliniic. Felix., Ociav.^ ii, 451. TertuUian declared it to be a symbol of the fires of hell. Possibly, also, the expense and publicity inseparable from the practice of cremation made it a matter of necessity for the early Chris- tians to adopt the less costly and more private mode of subterranean in- terment. Merivale, indeed, asserts that the early Roman Christians burned their dead, (vi, 444,) and adduces in support of this strange theory only the pagan dedication D. M., found on some Christian tombs. As win be shown, (Book III, i,) these letters were part of a common epigrapliic formula, and give no warrant for this startling statement. X r.ishop Hall. Their Origin and Early History. S 5 private sepulchres for single families ; indeed, some such tombs have been discovered in the vicinity of Rome, which never extended beyond a single chamber. They were excavated in the gardens or vineyards of the wealthy converts to Christianity, in imitation of that rock-hewn sepulchre consecrated by the body of Christ. The following inscription, which may still be seen in the most ancient part of the Catacombs of Sts. Nereus and Achilles, seem to refer to such a family tomb. Another inscription, found in the Catacomb of St. Nicome- des, restricts the use of the sepulchre to the original owner, and those of his dependents who belong to his religion — at [.\d] RELIGIONE.M PERTIN'EXTES MEAM. The names of many of the M. Antonius Res[ti]tutus burial crypts commemorate made [this] hypogeum for these original owners. Among himself and his [relatives] others those of Lucina, Pris- who believe in the Lord.* .„ , „ ■■,, ■ , ciUa, and UomitiUa are consid- ered to belong to the First Century, and the two former to the times of the Apostles. Some of these may have been originally designed, or afterwards opened, for the reception of the poor belonging to the Church; and thus the Catacombs would be indefinitely extended till they attained their present dimensions. TertuUian ex- * It would appear from this inscription that some of the family of Restitutus were still pagans, and were buried apart from the rest. The early Christians regarded it as unlawful to commingle the heathen and believers in common burial. St. Cyprian makes it a capital charge against the heretical Bibhop of Asturia, that he " buried his children in profane sepulclires and in the midst of stranf ers." See also Ruth i, 17. Compare Cic., de Leg., ii, 22, and dc Off., lib. ii. M ANTONI VS • RESTVTV S • FECIT ■ VPO GEV • SIBI • ET SVIS • FIOEXTI BVS- IN -DOMINO. 56 The Catacombs of Rome. pressly declares that the provision made for the poor included that for their \)\xx\s\.—egenis humandis* There is reason to believe that, even from the very first, the Christian Church at Rome contained not a few who were of noble blood and of high rank. In one of the apostolic epistles Paul conveys the salutation of Pudens, a Roman Senator, of Linus, reputed the first Roman bishop, and of Claudia, daughter of a British king ; f and we know that even in the Golden House of Nero, the scene of that colossal orgy whose record pol- lutes the pages of Suetonius and Tacitus, were disciples of the crucified Nazarene. In remarkable confirmation of this fact is the discovery in the recent explorations of the ruins of the Imperial Palace of several Christian memorials, including one of those lamps adorned with evangelical symbols, so common in the Catacombs. Much of the evidence on this subject has been lost by the zealous destruction of ecclesiastical records during the terrible Diocletian persecution ; but from inscrip- tions in the Catacombs, and from the incidental allu- * Apol. xxxix. The following inscription, recently discovered in the ruins of Ciesarea, a Roman tow-n in Africa, attests the provision made by wealthy Christians for the burial of their poorer neighbours : AREAM AT [AD] SEPVLCHRA CVLTOR VEREI CONTVLIT ET CELLAM strvxit svis cvnctis svmptibvs ECCLESIyE SANCT.^ HANC RELIQVIT MEMORIAM, SALVETEERATRES PVRO CORDEET SIMPLICI EVELPIVS VOS SATOS SANCTO SPIRITV. ECCLESIA FRATRVM HVNC RESTITVIT TITVLVM. . . . A worshipper of the Word has given this area for sepulchres, and has built a vault at his own cost ; he left this memorial to the Holy Church. Hail, brethren ! with a pure and simple heart, Huelpius [salutes] you, born of the Holy Spirit. The congregation of the brethren replaced this inscription. . . . f 2 Tim. iv, 21. Suet., Vit., Ner., c. 28, 29; Tac, Ann., xv, 37. See also Die, Ixiii, 13. Their Origin and Early History. 5 7 sions of early writers, we learn that persons of the high- est position, and even members of the Imperial family, were associated with the Christians in life and in death. Some of the noblest names of Rome occur in funeral epitaphs in some of the most ancient galleries of the Catacombs. There is evidence that even during the first century some who stood near the throne became converts to Christianity, and even died as martyrs for the faith.* But doubtless the preservation and advancement of true religion was better secured amid the dark recesses of the Catacombs, during the fiery persecutions that befel the Church, than it would have been in the sun- shine of imperial favour, in an age and court unparalleled for their corruptions. The sad decline of Christianity after the accession of Constantine makes it a matter of congratulation that in the earlier ages it was kept pure by the wholesome breezes of adversity. The new religion, notwithstanding all the efforts that were made for its suppression, rapidly spread, even in the high places of the earth. " We are but of yester- day," writes Tertullian at the close of the second cen- tury, "yet we fill every city, town, and island of the empire. We abound in the very camps and castles, in the council chamber and the palace, in the senate * E. g. Flavia Domitilla, the niece of Domitian, and her husband, Clemens. Their children had been adopted by the Emperor, and designated as his successors. So near came Christianity to grasping the sceptre of the Cjesars in the first century. Dio Cass., Hist., Ixvii, 13. Suet, in Doiiiit., xv. The niece of Domitilla, also of the same name, suffered exile for the faith, A. D. 97. She gave the land for the Catacomb which still bears her name. Mavcia, Mamma;a, the mother of Alex. Severus, the Emperor Philip, and Prisca and Valeria, the wife and daughter of the arch-pevsecutor Diocletian, either embraced or greatly favoured Christianity. 58 The Catacombs of Rome. and the forum; only your temples and theatres are left."* It is evident from an examination of the earliest Cat- acombs that they were not the offspring of fear on the part of the Christians. There was no attempt at se- crecy in their construction. They were, like the pagan tombs, situated on the high roads entering the city. Their entrances were frequently protected and adorned by elegant structures of masonry, such as that which is still visible at the Catacomb of St. Domitilla on the Via Ardeatina; f and their internal decorations and frescoes, which in the most ancient examples are of classic taste and beauty, were manifestly not executed by stealth and in haste, but in security and at leisure. There was, in classic times, a sacred character at- tached to all places set apart for the purposes of sepul- ture. They enjoyed the especial protection of the law, and were invested with "a sort of religious sanctity. J This protection was asserted in many successive edicts, and the heaviest penalties were inflicted on the viola- tors of tombs, as guilty of sacrilege. § Reverence for the sepulchres of the dead was regarded by the ancient mind as a religious virtue ; and the neglect of the ances- tral tomb even involved disability for municipal office. || *Apo!., w. 37. X Religiosum locum unusquisque sua voluntate facit, dum mortuum infert in locum suum. Marcian. Digest.^ \, S, 6, § 4. § Cod. jfuslin., lib. ix, tit. 1 9, (/.;■ Sefiiilc/iro Violate, leg. i, 5 ; Cod, Theod., lib. ix, tit. 17. Proximum sacrilegio majores semper habuerunl. So tlie poet exclaims : Res ea sacra, miser ; noli mea tangere fata: Sacrilegae bustis abstinuere manus. — "Touch not my monument, thou wretch ; it is a sacred thing : even s;icrilegious hands refrain from the violation of graves." II Xen., Man., ii, 2, § 13. Their Origin a)id Early History. 59 Being situated along the public highway, these pagan tombs were liable to various pollutions, to which nu- merous inscriptions refer. Hence the frequent cave VIATOR' — " Traveller, beware ! " — so common in classic epitaphs. The scriptor parce hoc opvs — "Writer, spare this work " — sometimes met with, is, as Kenrickwell remarks,* not the address of an author to a critic, but of a relative of the deceased, entreating the wall-scribbler not to disfigure a tomb. Electioneering notices were sometimes written upon these wayside monuments — a practice which is deprecated in the following : CANDIDATVS FIAT HONORATVS ET TV FELIX SCRIPTOR SI Hic NGN scRiPSERis — "May your candidate be hon- oured and yourself happy, O writer, if you write not on this tomb ! " i.xscriptor, rood te vt transeas MONV.MENTV.M — " Inscriber, I pray you pass by this monument." As these sepulchral areas, often of considerable ex- tent, were taken from the fields in the vicinity of a great city, where the land was very valuable for the purpose of tillage, they were in continual danger of in- vasion from the cupidity of the heirs or of adjacent land-owners, but for this legal protection. On many of the cippi, or funereal monuments, which line the public roads in the vicinity of Rome, the extent of these areas is set forth. Some of them are quite small, as is indi- cated in the following inscription : terrenvm sacra- TVM LONGVM p[eDEs] • X- LAT ■ p[eDEs] • X • FODERE NOLI • NE SACRiLEGiVM coMMiTT AS f — "A consecrated plot of earth, ten feet long and ten feet broad. Do not dig here, lest you commit sacrilege." More generally the size of the area is expressed, as * Roman Sepulchral Inscriptions, p. o, London, 1S5 S. 6o The Catacombs of Rome. in the following : in fronte p[edes] • ix in agro p[edes] ■ X ; that is, " Frontage on the road, nine feet ; depth in the field, ten feet." This area, small as it is, wai designed for several families. The limited space occupied by the cinerary urns rendered this quite pos- sible. Frequently, however, the size was much larger. An area one hundred and twenty-five feet square would be of very moderate extent. Horace mentions one one thousand feet by three hundred,* and sometimes they greatly exceed this, as one on the Via Labicana, five hun- dred by eighteen hundred feet, or over twenty English acres. There were also frequently exhedrce, or seats by the wayside, for passers-by, who were sometimes ex- horted to pause and read the inscription, or to pour a libation for the dead, as in the following: siste via- tor TV QVI VIA FLAMINIA TRANSIS, RESTA AC RELEGE " Stop, traveller, who passest by on the Flaminian Way; pause and read, and read again!" misce BiBE DA MiHi — " Mix, drink, and give to me." vi- ATORES SALVETE ET VALETE — "Travellers, hail and farewell." These burial plots were incapable of alienation or transfer from the families for whom they were orig- inally set apart ; who are sometimes enumerated in the inscription, or more generally expressed by the formulae, sibi svisqve fecit, sibi et posteris svis, or with the addition, libertis libertabvsqve posteris- qve, that is, "He made this for himself and his family," or "for himself and his descendants; " also "for his freed- men and freedwomen and their descendants." Sometimes this limitation is plainly asserted to be, vt ne vnqvam * Mille pedes in fronte, trecentos cippiis in agrum Hie dabat ; heredes monumentum ne sequeretur. Ilor., r Sat., viii, 12. Their Origin and Early History. Gl DE NOMINE FAMILIAE NOSTRAE HOC MONVMENTVM EXEAT — " That this monument may not go out of the name of our family." The cupidity of the inheritor of the es- tate is especially guarded against by the ever-recurring formula, H ■ M • H • N • s •, that is, Hoc T?wnumeiitu!n luBre- dem non sequitut "This monument descends not to the heir." Sometimes within a stately mausoleum reposed in solitary magnificence the dust of a single individ- ual, who in sullen exclusiveness declares in his epitaph that he has no associate even in the grave, or that he made his tomb for himself alone — in HOC MONVMENTO SOCIVM HABEO NVLLVM, Or, HOC SOLO SIBI FECIT. The violation of the monument is earnestly depre- cated in numerous inscriptions in some such terms as these : rogo per deos svperos inferosqve ne velitis ossA mea violare — "I beseech you, by the supernal and infernal gods, that you do not violate my bones." Sometimes this petition is accompanied by an impreca- tion of divine vengeance if it should be neglected, as, Qvi VIOLA VERIT DEOS SENTIAT IRATOS — "May he feel the wrath of the gods * who shall have violated [this tomb.] " Another invokes the fearful curse, qvisqvis HOC SVSTVLERIT AVT LAESERIT VLTIMVS SVORVM MO- RiATVR f — "Whoever shall take away or injure this [tomb] let him die the last of his race." From a distrust of posterity many erected their mon- uments during their life-time, and wrote their own epitaphs, leaving only a space for the age. This is some- times expressed by the words, sibi vivvs fecit, or, be VIVO, SE vivis, or even by such solecisms as me vivvs, or se vivvs. The following records the strange fact of the erection of a funereal monument by one living person to * Literally, "the angry gods." t Reinebius. 62 The Catacombs of Rome. another : semiramiae liciniae qvam loco filiae DILIGO OB MERITA EIVS VIVVS VIVAE FECI " To Semiva- mia Licinia, whom I love in place of my daughter : on account of her merits, alive, I made this to her alive." These classic usages have been thus detailed because traces of their influence may be observed in many prac- tices adopted by the primitive Christians, and because they furnish an explanation of those remarkable immu- nities and privileges which the Catacombs so long en- joyed. These latter were constructed in separate and limited areas, in like manner as the pagan sepulchres. De Rossi has given a map of the Catacomb of Callixtus, in which these areas are accurately defined. They vary in size and shape, that of the crypt of St. Lucina being one hundred feet in fronte and one hundred and eighty in agro, that of St. Cecilia two hundred and fifty feet in fi-onte and one hundred in agro, and others still larger. By the very tenor of the law these areas en- joyed the same protection as those of the pagan sepul- chres, of which protection it required a special edict to deprive them. Even when Christianity fell under the ban of persecution that freedom of sepulture was not at first interfered with. Having wreaked his cruel rage upon the living body, the pagan magistrate at least did not deny right of burial to the martyr's mutilated remains. A beneficent Roman law declared that the bodies even of those who died by the hand of the public executioner might be given up to any who asked for them.* So that even the sentence of outlawry against the Christians did not affect the bodies of the dead. Indeed, we know from ecclesiastical history that fre- quently the faithful received the remains of the martyrs * Corpora animadversorum quibuslibct petentibu? ad sepuUiiram danda sunt. Digest., xlviii, 24, ^.. Their Origin and Early Histoiy. 63 and gave them Christian burial. It was not till the third century, when the pagan opposition to Christianity became intense and bitter, that the persecutors waged war upon the dead. Although both Diocletian and Max- imian confirmed the decree just cited, it often happened that, in order that the Christians might not have even the melancholy consolation of gathering up the martyrs' bones, and honouring the remains of their fallen heroes, those sacred relics were denied the rites of sepulture which were freely accorded to the body of the vilest malefactor. These areas, Christian as well as pagan, were under the guardianship of the Roman Pontifices, who, although pagans, were actually confirmed in their authority by the Christian Emperor Constans. In consequence of this protection the Christians were enabled to conduct their worship and celebrate their agapcB in the oratories or other buildings erected o\'er the Catacombs, the ruins of which are still to be seen at the Catacombs of St. Domitilla and Sts. Nereus and Achilles, and which to the popular apprehension would seem to correspond to the pagan structures for the celebration of funeral banquets. Even when oppressed and persecuted above ground, they found a sanctuary beneath its surface, and were permitted by the ignorance or indifference of their foes to worship God among the holy dead. So long as their sepulchral areas were uninvaded the Christians scrupu- lously abstained from extending their excavations be- yond their respective limits, digging lower //a/z/ instead, when insatiate death demanded room for still more graves. But when the ruthless persecutor pursued them even be- neath the earth, they felt at liberty to transcend those limits and burrow in any direction for safety or escape. The Christian inscriptions often strongly deprecate C4 The Catacombs of Rome. the violation of the graves to which they are at- tached, in like manner as we have seen in pagan epi- taphs, and against this crime the Fathers intensely inveigh. Sometimes the petition assumes a most sol- emn character, as this : [adivro] vos per c[h]ristvm, NE .MIHI AB ALIQVO VIOLENTIAM \sic\ FIAT ET NE SEPVLCRVM MEVM viOLETVR — "[I conjure] you by Christ that no violence be offered me by any one, and that my sepulchre may not be violated." Still more awful in its adjuration is the following : conivro vos PER TREMENDV^t DIEM IVDICII VT HA\C SEPVLTVRAM NVLLI VIOLENT* — "I conjure you by the dreadful day of judgment that no one violate this sepulchre." Sometimes a most terrible imprecation is expressed, as in the following : MALE ■ PEREAT • INSEPVLTVS lACEAT • NON • RESVRGAT CVM ■ IVDA ■ PARTEM • HABEAT SI • QVIS • SEPVLCHRVM • HVNC • VIOLAVERIT — If any one shall violate this sepulchre, Let him perish miserably and remain unburied ; Let him lie down and not rise again, Let him have liis portion with Judas.t [emi] gravit ad xpm sepvlcrvm violare sit alienvs a regno dei. Has departed to Christ. [If anyone dare] to violate this sepulchre, let him. . . .and be far from the kingdom of God,]: * Both of these are given by Dr. McCaul in his C/irislian Epi- taphs of the First Six Centuries, an admirable little volume, my indebtedness to which will be elsewhere acknowledged. He also quotes the following from Henzen's Iiiscr. Lat. Select, Col., No. 6371 : PETOAPOBIS [VOBIS] FRATRES BONI PER VNVM UEVM NE QVIS VI TI- T VLO MOLESTET POST MORTEM — "I beseech you, good brothers, by the one God, that no one by force injure this inscription after my death." f Aringhi, lib. iv, c. xxvii. X Sometimes an anathema was invoked upon the disturber of the Their Origin and Early History. 65 It is probable that this dread of the violation of the grave arose, in part at least, from the fear that the disper- sion of the remains might impede the resurrection of the body; and also from that natural aversion to the disturb- ance of the slumbering dust, so passionately expressed on the tombstone of England's greatest dramatist.* We sometimes find also the announcement upon Chris- tian as well as upon pagan tombs, that they have been prepared while the tenants were yet alive, as in the fol- lowing: LOCVS BASILIONIS SE BIBO FECIT "The plaCC of Basilio, he made it when alive ; " sabini bisomvm se BIBVM FECIT SIBI IN CEMETERIVM BALBINAE IN CRYPTA NOB A \sic\ — " The bisomus of Sabinus, he made it for himself during his life-time, in the cemetery of Balbina, in the new qrypt." As Sabinus could only occupy one half of this, the other half was probably intended for his wife. Observe in the following the beautiful euphemism for the grave. It is calmly chosen as the last long home, grave, as in the following interesting example, found in the island of Salamis, and quoted by Dr. McCaul from Kirchoff, Corpus, Iiiscrlpt. Grtcc.^ No. 9303 : Ol/co^ aluvtoc 'Ayd^wi/of uvayvuarov nal ^inpTjuia^ kv dvai dijKai^ Idiq, EKaarCf) Tjfiijv. Et de rtf ruv Iditjv y CTC/jof rtf ToXiiTjGri aufia Karadkadai evravda vrapef riju dvu rjfiijv, Xoyov dtjTf ru deu unl uvuOefia tjto /lapavaftdu — "The everlasting dwelling of Agatho, a reader, and Kuphemia, in two graves, one for each of us separately. If any one of our relatives, or any one else, shall pre- sume to bury a body here beside us two, may he give an account of it to God, and may he be anathema maranatha.'' * It is remarkable that Shakespeare's epitaph should present almost as uncouth a specimen of epigraphy as any of the barbarous inscrip- tions of the Catacombs. See the following copy : Good Friend for lesus SAKE forbeare To diGO T-E Dust EncloAsed HERe Blest be T-E Man ''' spares T-es Stones And curst be lle"^ moves my Bones. Y 66 The Catacombs of Rome. % as the "house ap- pointed for all liv- "X^^L ANRTf R (7 S UIXLTA/VUD/V another and still more remarkable resemblance be- tween the funeral V ^ 1 f I P \/ I 'T' r\ usages of the pa- A Vj ( L L U A I | Xj r„: "!'':; o/wMUiUsiNPACF yet mentioned, pig. 1 9.— Epitaph from Lapidarlan and one which GaUery* greatly contributed to the freedom of action and secur- ity of the latter. There is abundant monumental and other evidence of the existence in Rome, in the time of the later Republic and of the Empire, of certain funeral confraternities — collegia, as they were called — much like the modern burial clubs. A remarkable inscription of the time of Hadrian, A. D. 103, found at Lavigna, nineteen miles from Rome, on the Appian Way, gives an insight into their constitution and objects. With much legal tautology it sets forth the privilege of this collegium of the worshippers of Diana and the new divinity Antinous appointed by a decree of the Roman Senate and people, to assemble, convene, and have an association for the burial of the dead.f The members * Maitland reads thus : IN christo. martyrivs vi.xit annos XCI PLTS MINVS ELEXIT DO.MVM VIVVS. IN PACE. "In Christ. Martyrius lived ninety-one years, more or less. He chose a home during his life-time. In peace." t Collegium salutare Diance et Antinoi, constitutum ex Senatus Populique Komani dccveto, quibus coirc, convenire, collegiumqiie h.abere liceat. Qui stipeui menstruam conferic volent in funera, in Their Origin and Early History. 67 of this confraternity were to pay for that purpose a hundred sesterces at entrance, besides an amphora of good wine, and five uses a month thereafter,* all of which was forfeited by the non-payment of the monthly dues. Three hundred sesterces were expended on the funeral, fifty of which were to be distributed at the cremation of the body. If a member died at a distance from Rome three of the confraternity were sent to fetch the body. Even if they failed to obtain it the funeral rites were duly paid to an effigy of the deceased. There was also provision made for the members dining together on anniversary and other occasions according to rules duly prescribed by the collegium. The names of very many of these collegia have been preserved, each of which consisted of the members of a similar profession or handicraft. Thus we have the Collegium Medicorum, the association of the physicians ; Aurificum, of the gold-workers ; Tignariorian, of the car- penters ; Dendrophororu?n, of the wood-fellers ; Fellion- ariorum, of the furriers ; Nautarzitn, of the sailors ; Pab- ulariorufn, of the forage merchants ; Aurigariorum, of the charioteers; and Utriculariorum, of the bargemen. f They were frequently also connected by the bond of nationality or of common religious observance, as Col- legium Germanorum, the association of the Germans ; Pastophororum, of the priests of Isis ; Serapidis et Isidis, of Serapis and Isis ; ySsculapii et Sygeice, of .^Esculapius and Hygeia. % Sometimes they were Cultores Veneris, Jovis, Herculis, worshippers of Venus, Jupiter, Hercules, or, as we have seen, of Diana and Antinous. id collegium coeant, neque sub specie ejus collegii nisi semel in mense coeant, confereiidi causa unde defuncti sepeliantur. * The sesterce, or sestertius, was about 2d ■ 5 fartliings, the as about 3d '4 fartiiings. Tlie anipkora held about six gallons. t Muratori, torn, ii, classis vii, Collegia Varia. % Ibid. 68 The Catacombs of Rome. These associations were often favoured with especial privileges, immunities, and rights, like those of incorpo- ration, such as the holding of territorial property. De Rossi has shown, by ample citations, that the emperors, who were always opposed to associations among the citizens, made a special exemption in favour of these funeral clubs.* By conformity to the constitution of these corpora- tions the Christian church had peculiar facilities for the burial of its dead, and even for the celebration of relig- ious worship. Indeed, it has been suggested, and is highly probable, that it was under the cover of these funeral asso- ciations that toleration was conceded, first to the sepul- chres, then to the churches. Tertullian describes the practice of the Christian community in the second cen- tury as follows : " Every one offers a small contribution on a certain day of the month, or when he chooses, and as he is able, for no one is compelled ; it is a voluntary offering. This is our common fund for piety ; for it is not expended in feasting and drinking and in wanton excesses, but in feeding and burying the poor, in support- ing orphans, aged persons, and such as are shipwrecked, or such as languish in mines, in exile, or in prison.'' f Thus the Ecclesia Fratrum, the " Congregation of the Brethren," who restored the funeral monument described on page fifty-six,t suggests the pagan college of the Fra- * Trajan regarded with suspicion even fire brigades and charitable societies, (Pliny. X Epis. 43 et 94,) and forbade the assemblies of the Christians, but permitted the monthly contribution of the clubs — Per- mittitur tenuioribus stipem menstruam conferre. Digest.^ xlvii, 22, i. f Modicam unusquisque stipem menstrua die, vel quum velit, et si modo velit, et si modo possit, apponit : nam nemo compellitur, sed sponte confert . . . Nam inde non epulis . . . sed egenis alendis Jiuniandlsque . . . etc. Tert., Apoi., u. 39. :J: Sec first footnote. Their Origin and Early History. 6g tres Arvales; and the Cultor l^erbi, or worshipper of the Divine Word, in the same inscription, would seem to the heathen magistrate analogous to the Cidtores Jovis or Cultores DiaiKZ of the pagan collegia. Indeed, it is diffi- cult to decide from the names of some of these associa- tions whether they were Christian or pagan. Thus we read of the Collegium convictorum qui una epiclo vesci solent — "The fraternity of table-companions who are accus- tomed to feast together." De Rossi suggests that there may be here a covert reference to a Christian community, and probably to the celebration of the Agape or of the Eucharist.* Another is the Collegium quod est in domo SergicB Paulines — " The association which is in the house of Sergia Paulina." This possibly may have been a Christian community, like " the church which was in the house " of Priscilla and Aquila.f That the primitive Christians availed themselves of the privileges granted to the funeral associations, is con- firmed by a discovery made by De Rossi in the Ceme- tery of St. Domitilla in the year 1865, and already re- ferred to. At the entrance was found a chamber, with stone seats like the schola, or place of meeting of the pagan tombs where the religious confraternity celebrated the funeral banquet of the deceased. Here the Christians celebrated instead the Agape, or Fea^t of Charity, and the Nataliiia, or anniversary of the martyrs who were buried there, just as the pagan associations commemorated the anniversaries of their deceased patrons. The ancient privileges of these collegia were confirmed by an edict of Septimius Severus about the year A. D. 200. It is a curious coincidence that precisely at this time Zephyrinus, bishop of Rome, appointed Callixtus * Bnllettino, 1S64, C2. f Rom. xvi, 5, 3. 70 The Catacombs of Rome. to be " guardian of the cemetery," as well as head of the clergy.* In order to secure to the funeral associa- tion the protection of the law it was necessary that one of its members should be appointed agent or " syndic,'' by whom its business should be transacted, and in whose name its property should be held.f Thus Callixtus be- came the syndic of the public cemetery of the church, which still bears his name. De Rossi conjectures that this was the first cemetery set apart for the use of the whole Christian community. Hence it was taken under the care of the ecclesiastical authorities, and became, as we shall see hereafter, the burying-place of the Roman bishops, and the especial property of the church. X We will now trace briefly the history of those perse- cutions which glutted the Catacombs with victims, and at times drove the church for sanctuary to their deep- est recesses. We have seen that Christianity grew up under the protection accorded to Judaism as one of the tolerated religions of Rome. But this toleration did not long continue. In Rome as well as elsewhere the new creed was doomed to a baptism of blood. The causes of this persecution are not far to seek. The Chris- tian doctrine spread rapidly, and early excited the jeal- ousy of the Roman authorities by its numerous converts from the national faith, many of whom were of exalted rank. These carefully refrained from the idolatrous adulation by which the servile mob were wont to express * PJiilosophoumena, ix, ii. \ Actorem sive syndicum, per quem, quod communiter agi fierique oporteat, agatur, fiat. — Digest., iii, 4, I, § I. \ E veramente che almeno fino dal secolo terzo i fideli abbiano pos- siduto cemeteri a nome commune, e che il loro pof;sesso sia stato riconosciuto dagl' imperatori, 6 cosa impossibile a negare. — De Rossi, Rom. Salt., torn, i, p. 103. TJieir Origin and Early Structure. 7 1 their loyalty to the imperial monster who aspired to be a god. Hence they were accused of disaffection, of trea- son.* They were the enemies of Caesar, and of the Roman people. f They were supposed to exert a malign influence on the course of nature. If it did not rain the Christians were to blame. J "If the Tiber over- flows its banks," says TertuUian, " or the Nile does not ; if there be drought or earthquakes, famine or pestilence, the cry is raised, ' The Christians to the lions .' ' " § If the pecking of the sacred chickens or the entrails of the sac- rificial victims gave unfavourable omens, it was attributed to the counter spell of " the atheists." At Rome, as well as at Ephesus and Philippi, the selfish fears of the shrine and image makers, whose " craft was in danger,'' and the hostility of the priests and dependents on the idol- worship, inspired or intensified the opposition to Chris- tianity, as did also the jealousy of the Jews, who regarded with especial hostility the believers in the lowly Nazarene, whom their fathers with wicked hands had crucified and slain. || The terrible conflagration which destroyed the greater part of the city during the reign of Nero was made the excuse for the first outburst of persecution against the Christian community. By public rumour this deed was * The dreaded crimen majestatis. \ Hostes Csesarum, hostes populi Romani. X Non pluit Deu5, due ad Christianos. — Aug., Civ. Dei, ii, 3. § Si Tiberis ascendit in mcEnia, si Nilus hon ascendit in arva, si coelum stetit, si terra movit, si fames, si lues, statim, "Christianos ad leones." — Apol., >.. "But I pray you," he adds, "were misfortunes unknown before Tiberius ? Tlie (rue God was not worshipped when Hannibal conquered at Canna;, or the Gauls filled the city." II Eusebius describes their activity in bringing wood and straw from the shops and baths for tlie burning of Polycarp. Ecel. Hist., iv. 15. 72 The Catacombs of Rome. attributed to Nero himself. " To put an end to this re- port," says Tacitus, " he laid the guilt, and inflicted the most cruel punishment, upon these men, who, already branded with infamy, were called by the vulgar. Chris- tians. . . . Their sufferings at their executions," he adds, " were aggravated by insult and mockery ; for some were sewn up in the skins of wild beasts, and wor- ried to death by dogs ; some were crucified, and some, wrapped in garments of pitch, were burned as torches to illumine the night."* During this persecution -St. Paul fell a victim, A. D. 64. He was beheaded " without the gate," on the Ostian Way, and weeping friends took up his bleeding corpse and laid it, according to tradition, in one of the most ancient crypts of an adjoining Catacomb, where Euse- bius asserts that his tomb could be seen in his day.f From this time Christianity was exposed to outbursts of heathen rage, and express decrees were published against it. J No longer sharing the protection of Juda- ism, it fell under the ban of the empire. At times the rage of persecution slumbered, and again it burst forth with inextinguishable fury. But, like the typical bush that " flourished unconsumed in fire," the Christian faith but grew and spread the more. Yet the sword ever im- =f Efgq abQle^dq iHtnori Nero subdedit reos et qusesitissimis pcEnis aflfecit, quQS per flasltia invisos vulgus Cliiistianos appellabat. . . . Et pereuntihus addjta ludibria, ut fevariim tergis contectilaniatu caimm interievint, aut cfucibiis affixi, aut flammandi atqiie, ubi de- fecioset dies, in usum nqcturni luminis ui'ecentup. — Ann., xv, 44. f A telegraphic despatch fron> Rome of date Jamiaiy 16, 1S73, announces that the Pope claims to haye discovered the bodies of the apostles Philip and James. Highly improbable, and of no practical importance if true. >fot the bones of the saints buried centuries ago, but the spirit which animated them i^nd the principles forwhicli they died, are the true sources of the church's po^ef. X .Sulpic. Sever., /fisi ^ ii, 41. Their Origin and Early History. 73 pended over the church. Somethnes its stroke was for a time deferred, when the little flock took courage and rejoiced; but often it fell with crushing weight, smiting the shepherds and scattering the sheep. One of these periods of rest e.xtended from the time of the Neronian persecution till near the end of the century, when Do- mitian, "a second Nero,"* stretched forth his hand again to vex the saints. During the short reign of the "justice-loving Nerva " the Christians again enjoyed repose, so that Lactantius even asserts that they were restored to all their former privileges. To the first century De Rossi refers the construction of at least three or four of the Catacombs. These are, (i) the Cemetery of Priscilla, excavated, according to an ancient tradition, in the property of the Roman Senator Pudens, mentioned by St. Paul, and in which, it is said, were interred his daughters Pudentiana and Praxides ; (2) the Catacomb of Domitilla, the grand- niece of the Emperor Domitian, in which she herself was buried, together with her chamberlains Nereus and Achilles, who were beheaded for their steadfastness in the Christian faith ; (3) the Crypt of Lucina, afterwards part of the Catacomb of Callixtus, in which some of the most ancient inscriptions have been found. De Rossi conjectures that this lady is the same as the Pomponia Grascina before mentioned, the wife of Plautius, the con- queror of Britain. (4) De Rossi is also of the opinion that he has discovered another, and the oldest ot all the Catacombs, dating from the very times of the apostles themselves, in that known as the Pons Petri, or the Cemetery of the Font of Peter, in which tradition as- serts that he himself baptized. The classical style of the architecture, frescoes, and graceful stucco wreaths and * F.useb.. Uisl. F.rcles., iii, 17. A. D. 93-96. 74 The Catacombs of Rome. garlands, and the character of the inscriptions, aH point to a very ancient period, before art had degenerated, and before long-continued persecution had banished Chris- tianity into seclusion and poverty. The law of Trajan against secret assemblies, synchro- nous with the opening of the second century, gave a new occasion of persecuting the Church. With such severity was this done that, according to Pliny, the deserted temples became again frequented, and their neglected rites revived.* The Emperor Hadrian is described by his contempo- raries as diligently practising the Roman rites, and despising all foreign religions. f Although he restrained the tumultuous attacks of the populace upon the Chris- tians, he nevertlieless favoured their legal prosecution. J The following epitaph given by Maitland com- memorates a martyrdom of this reign. The last sen- tence seems to imply that it was erected in a time of actual persecution ; but no dated example of the mono- gram which accompanies it appears before the time of Constantine. The inscription was probably written long * Prope jam desolata templa coepis.se celebrari ; et sacra solennia diu intermissa repeti. — Epis. ad Traj. Among the most distin- guished sufferers during this persecution was Clement, third bishop of Rome, exiled to Pontus, and, it is said, cast into the sea, A. D. 103; also the venerable Ignatius, bishop of the church at Antioch, linked by tradition with the Saviour himself, as one of the children whom he took in his arms and blessed. Con- demned by Trajan to exposure to wild beasts in the amphitheatre at Rome, a passion for martyrdom possessed his soul. " Suffer me to be the food of the wild beasts," he exclaimed, "by whom I shall attain unto God. For I am the wheat of God; and I shall be ground by the teeth of wild beasts that I may become the pure bread of Christ.'* — Epis. ad Romanos, §§ 4, 5. t Sacra Romana diligentissime curavit, peregrina contempsit. — Spar- tian, in Hadrian. A. D. 117-138. \ luiseb., Hist. Ecclis , iv, 9. Jus. Mar., A]wl., i, 6S, 6g. Their Origin and Early History. 75 after the death of Marius, or the monogram may have been added by a later hand : TEMPORE ADRIANI IMPERATO.IIS MARIVS ADOLESCENS DVX MILITVM QVI SATIS VIXIT X "TVk DVM VITAM PRO CHO CVM SAXGVIN'E CON SVNSIT IN PACE TANDEM QVIEVIT BENE MERENTES CVM LACRIMIS ET METV POSVE RVNT I. D. VI. Ill Christ. In the time of the Emperor Hadrian, Marius, a young military officer, who had lived long enough, when, with his blood, he gave up his life for Christ. At length he rested in peace. The well-deserving set up this with tears and in fear, on the 6th, Ides of December. In this reign also suffered Alexander, bishop of Rome, whose tomb has been found on the Nomentan Way, together with Eventius and Theodulus, a presbyter and deacon. Under the humane and equitable Antoninus Pius,* Christianity seems to have enjoyed a partial toleration, although the edict of Trajan was still unrevoked. Yet several outbreaks of popular fury against the Chris- tians took place, and in the very first year of his reign Telesphorus, the bishop of the church at Rome, suf- fered martyrdom. f One of the strangest phenomena in history is the per- secution of the primitive church by the philosophical emperor Marcus Aurelius, J whose " Meditations " seem almost like the writings of an apostle in their praise of virtue, yearning for abstract perfection, and contempt of pomp and pleasure. Nevertheless, he was one of the most systematic and heartless of all the oppressors of the Christian faith — a faith so much loftier than even * A. V>. 13S-161. t Iren;L'US, iii, % § 3. t A. O. 161-1S0. 76 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. his high philosophy, and yet having so muc"h akin. AVith the cpol acerbity of a stoic, he resolved to exterminate the obnoxious doctrines. An active inquisition for the Christians was set on foot, and the odious system of domestic espionage, which even Trajan had forbidden, was encouraged. Shameless informers, greedy for gain, fed their rapacity on the confiscated spoils of the be- lievers, whom they plundered, says Melito, by day and by night. Though gentle to other classes of offenders, and even to rebels, Aurelius exceeded in barbarity the most ruthless of his predecessors in the refinements of tor- ture, by rack and scourge, by fire and stake, employed to enforce the recantation of the Christians ; and every year of his long reign was polluted with innocent blood. From Gaul to Asia Minor raged the storm of perse- cution. The earthquakes, floods, and famine, the wars and pestilence, that wasted the empire, were visited upon the hapless Christians, who were immolated in heca- tombs as the causes of these dire calamities. From the crowded amphitheatre of Smyrna ascended, as in a chariot of fire, the soul of the apostolic bishop Polycarp. The arrowy Rhone ran red with martyrs' blood. The names of the venerable Pothinus, of the youthful Blandina and Ponticus, and of the valiant Symphorianus, will be memories of thrilling power and pathos to the end of time. At Rome the persecution selected some of its noblest victims. Justin, the Christian philosopher, find- ing in the Gospels a loftier lore than in the teachings of Zeno or Aristotle, of Pythagoras or Plato, became the foremost of the goodly phalanx of apologists and defenders of the faith, and sealed his testimony with his blood. With six of his companions he was brought be- fore the prefect for refusing obedience to the imperial Their Origin and Early History. 77 decree. "We are Christians," they said, "and sacrifice not to idols." They were forthwith scourged and be- headed, and devout men bore them to their burial, doubtless in these very Catacombs, where their undis- covered remains may yet lie. In this reign also suffered the seven sons of St. Felicitas — the tomb of one of whom De Rossi believes he has found — and St. Cecilia and her companions, to be hereafter mentioned.* * The follo\ving inscription, referring to the Antonine period, is given by Maitland, (page 40,) as from the Catacomb of CalUxtus. Although it seems to imply the actual prevalence of persecution, it is evidently, even if genuine, of later date than the time alleged. The presence of the sacred monogram, as well as the somewhat florid and pleonastic style, indicate an origin not anterior to the age of Constantine, when it became the fashion with outward pharisaism to adorn the sepulchres of the martyrs, although the truths for which they died were often treated with neglect : ALEXANDER MORTVVS NGN EST SED VIVIT SVPER ASTRA ET CORPVS IN HOC TVMVLO QVIESCIT. VITAM EXPLEVIT SVB ANTONINO IMP QVI VBI MVL TVM BENEFITII AN'TEVE.NIRE PRAEVIDERET PRO GRA X p) , TIA ODIVM REDDIDIT. GENVA ENIM FLEC "y^ TF.NS VERO DEO SACRIFICATVRVS AD SVP V^ \ PLICIA DVCITVR. O TEMPORA INFAVSTA QVIBVS I.N'TER SACRA ET VOTA NE IN CAV ERNIS QVIDEM SALVARI POSSIMVS. QVID MISERIVS VITA SED QVID MISERIVS IN MOKTE CVM AB AMICIS ET PARENTIBVS SEPELIRI NEQVEAN'T TANDEM IN COELO CORVSCANT. PARVM VIXIT QVI VIXIT IN. X. TEM. " In Christ. Alexander is not dead, but lives above the stars, and his body rests in this tomb. He ended his ■"S'-^O.— Re- ,-f J .1. T- A . ■ L r • , puted Mar- life under the Jimperor Antonine, who, foreseeing that tvrSvmbol great benefit would result from his services, returned evil for good. For while on his knees and about to sacrifice to the true God, he was led away to execution. O sad times ! in which, among sacred rites and prayers, even in caverns we are not safe. What can be more wretched than such a life? and what than such a death? when they cannot be buried by their friends and relations — 78 The Catacombs of Rome. The legend of the Thundering Legion, supported as it is by the medals and the column of Antoninus, com- memorates, indeed, the deliverance of the Roman army by a timely shower ; but the Emperor ascribed that deliverance not to the prayers of the Christians, but to his own appeal to the heathen gods,* and there is no evidence that he ever relaxed the severity of the persecution. The ferocity of the brutal Commodus f was tempered by the influence of his concubine, Marcia, and Chris- tianity spread among the highest ranks ; but persecution at length they sparkle in heaven. He has scarcely lived who has lived in Christian times." Maitland renders the concluding letters, IN. X. TEM, by " In Chris- tianis temporibus." The furnace seems to indicate that the martyr suffered death by fire, or, possibly, by immersion in boiling oil — a mode of punishment which St. John is said to have. undergone, but without receiving any harm. Another still more apocryphal inscription is given by Maitland, (page 65.) It is probably of the fifth century. The Pudentiana re- ferred to is said to have spent her patrimony in relieving the poor and burying the martyrs. HOC EST COEMETERIVM PRISCILLAE IN QVO E.XISTVNT CORPORA TRIVM MILLIVM MARTYRVM MARTYRIO PER ANTONINUM IMPERATOREM AFFECTORVM QVOS S. PVDENTIANA FECIT IN HOC SVO VENERABILI TEMPLO SEPELIRI. " This is the Cemetery of Priscilla, in which are the bodies of three thousand martyrs, who suffered under the Emperor Antonine, whom St. Pudentiana caused to be buried in this her own place of worship " — Aicher, Hortus Inscriptionnm. More authentic relics of this reign are the large tiles with which part of the Catacomb of Callixtus is paved. They all bear the words, OPVS DoLiARE EX praediis do.mi- NI N ET FIGL NOVIS, which, according to Marini, is the stamp of the imperiil manufactory of Marcus Aurelius. * " Hanc dextram ad te Jupiter, tendo, quae nuUius unquam san- guiiiam fuvlit," i-> the form of prayer given by Claudian. Euseb., v, 5. t A. D. i::o-i93. Their Origin and Early History. 79 did not entirely cease. Apollonius, a senator of the empire, was put to death at Rome, and we read of numer- ous martyrdoms elsewhere. A Christian inscription commemorates an officer of Commodus, and Procurator of the Imperial household, who was " received to God " RECEPTVS AD DEVM A. D. 2 I 7.* On the death of this emperor the persecution raged with such violence that, according to Clemens Ale.xan- drinus, many martyrs were burned, crucified, and be- headed every day.f Non licet esse vos — " It is not lawful for you to exist " — was the stern edict of extermination pronounced against the saints. Christianity had little favour to expect from a military despot like Septimius Severus, whose dying counsel to his successor expressed the principle of his govern- ment — "Be generous to the soldiers and trample on all besides." The revived accusations against the new faith called forth the bold defence, or rather defiance, of Tertullian, one of the noblest monuments of the primitive ages. In this reign the sanctity of the Christian cemeteries was first violated, and that not at Rome but in Africa, where the persecution was most virulent. " The mob assails us with stones and flames with the frenzy of bacchanals," says Tertullian ; " They do not even spare the Christian dead, but tear them from the rest of the tomb, from the asylum of death, cut them in pieces, and rend them asunder." % * See chap, ii, book iii. \ Strom., lib. ii, A. D. 193. X ApoL, 37. Sicut sub Hilariano preside, cum de areis sepultura- rum nostrariim adclam'issent, areze non sint. — Ad Scap., c. iii. A. D. 203. Xo more patlietic episode is contained in the -wliule ranye of tlie Martyroloi^'y than that of the youthful mother, I'erpetua, ulio sul- 8o The Catacombs of Rome. After the cessation of this persecution the Church enjoyed a period of unwonted rest. Although under the ignoble Heliogabalus the sensual Asiatic worship of Baal was introduced to Rome, and human sacrifice was even offered to this Eastern Moloch,* yet the relig- ion of peace and purity shared the toleration accorded to the most obscene and cruel rites. The just and ami- able Alexander Severus inaugurated a new era for Christianity,! to which he was favourably disposed, prob- ably through the influence of his mother, Mammaea, who had enjoyed at Antioch the instruction of Origen.J He used frequently to quote with approval the Golden Rule of Our Lord, and caused it to be inscribed on his palace walls, and also ceded to the Christians a piece of public ground for the erection of a church. § But Alexander was only a religious eclectic, honouring what he thought best in the current systems of belief. Of this reign is the epitaph -of Urban, bishop of Rome, fered at Carthage under Severus. Few can read unmoved the acts of her martyrdom, which bear the stamp of authenticity in their per- fectly natural and unexaggerated tone, and the absence of miracle. Young — she was only twenty-two — beautiful, of noble family, and dearly loved, her heathen father entreated her to pity his gray hairs, her mother's tears, her helpless babe. But her faith proved triumphant over even the yearnings of natural affection ; and, wan and faint from recent childbirth pangs, she was led, with Pelicitas, her companion, into the crowded amphitheatre, and exposed to the cruel horns of in- furiate beasts. Amid the agonies of death, more conscious of her wounded modesty than of her pain, with a gesture of dignity she drew her disheveled robe about her person. She seemed rapt in ecstasy till by a merciful stroke of the gladiator she was released from her suffer- ing, and exchanged the dust and blood of the arena, and the shouts of the ribald mob, for the songs of the redeemed, and the beatific vision of the Lord she loved. * Coedit et humanas hostias. — Lamprid., J-hHogabalns. \ A. D. 222. { Euseb., Hist. Eccles., vi, 21. § The site, according to tradition, of St. Maria in Trastevere. TJuir Origin and Early History. 81 whjcli hAS been found in the so-called " Papal Crypt,'' bearing his name and the initial letter of his title — OTRBANOC E, . . . The accession of the Thracian savage, Maximin, A. D. 235, was the signal for a fresh outburst of persecution. To have been favoured by Severus was sufficient to incur the hate of his murderer. His rage was especially di- rected against the chief pastors of the flock of Christ. Pontiaaus, the Roman bishop, was e.xiled to Sardinia, and there slain, Antherus, his successor in this danger- ous dignity, for his zeal in preserving the records of the martyrs himself suffered martyrdom a few weeks after his accession, and was laid in that narrow chamber des- tined to receive so many of Rome's early bishops, where a slab bearing his name and title — ANTEPQC-EHI — has been found. In this reign also suffered the cele- brated Hippolytus, bishop oi Pontus, and author of the " Philosophoumena," Under Gordian and Philip a respite was again granted to the persecuted church. The latter, indeed, is claimed by Eusebius as a Christian; but his character and con- duct are inconsistent with such a supposition. A violent reaction took place on the accession of Decius, whose name became an object of execration to mankind,* He resolved to entirely crush and extirpate Christianity, whose bishops and churches began to rival the pontiffs and temples of the gods of Rome. At his instigation a persecution of unprecedented virulence raged like an epidemic throughout the empire. The imperial edicts enforced conformity to the pagan ritual under penalty of the most horrible tortures. This un- * A. D- 250-253. lixecrablle animal Decius, qui vexaret ecclesiam. — Lactan., di Mort. Pa s^r., t. 3, 4. He would ralher tolerate, lie said, a rival for his tliroiie, than a bisliop in Rome. Cypr., Ep. 53. 6 82 The Catacombs of Route. wonted severity produced the first great apostasy of the primitive church ; and many of the less stable converts procured exemption from martyrdom by sacrificing to the gods, burning incense on their altars, or purchasing certificates of indulgence from the heathen magistrate.* "Pale and trembling, and more like sacrificial victims than those about to sacrifice," says an eye-witness, " some approached the heathen shrines ; but others, firm and blessed pillars of the Lord, witnessed a good confession unto death." f The bishops of the church, who, as the leaders of Christ's sacramental host, bore gallantly the battle's brunt, were naturally the earliest victims of the tyrant's rage. Accordingly, at the very outbreak of the Decian slaughter, the venerable Fabian, head of the Roman church, perished by decapitation ; and the Catacombs were glutted with a host of unknown mar- tyrs. In the very chamber in the Cemetery of Callixtus to which his mutilated corpse was borne, may still be seen the Bishop's epitaph — *ABIANOC ■ EfEl — with the monogram of his martyrdom, the conjoined letters MTP, added probably by a later hand. The church seemed * Called respectively Sacrlficati^ Thicrificatt^ and Libellatici, of whom the first were esteemed the most ,£^iilty. Tiie indignant rhetoric of Cyprian expresses his holy horror at this vile apostasy : "They made haste to give their souls the mortal wound. . . That altar where he was about to die — was it not his funeral pile ? Should he not have fled, as from his coffin or his grave, from that devil's altar, when he saw it smoke and fume with stmking smell ? . . . Thou thyself wast the sacrificial victim. Thou didst sacrifice thy salvation, and burn thy faith and hope in these abominable fires " — Nonne ara ilia, quo moriturus accessit, rogus illi fuit ? Nonne diaboli altare cjuod fcEtore ttetro fumare et redolere conspexerat, velut funus et bustum vitcesuEehorrere ac fugere debebat? . Ipse.-idaram hostia, viclima ipse venisti. Immol.'.sti illic salutem tuam, spem tuam, fidem tuani, funcstis illis ignibus concremilsti. — De Lapsis., p. 124. f Oionysius of Alexandria, in Eiisch , vi, 41. Their Origin and Early History. 83 paralyzed with fear, and for sixteen months no suc- cessor was elected. But, undismayed by the tragic fate of Fabian, Cornelius, allied with some of the noblest families of Rome, became the leader of the forlorn hope of Christianity against all the power of the empire. After a year's episcopate he was first banished and then beheaded under Gallus, a worthy successor in persecu- tion of Decius. Through the archaeological researches of De Rossi have been recovered, first his epitaph — CORNELIVS - MARTYR ■ EP — and then his tomb, with a Damasine inscription, in one of the most interest- ing crypts of the Catacombs. Lucius, his successor, in six months shared his fate, and was buried in the cham- ber consecrated by the dust of so many martyr-bishops, where his brief epitaph — AOVKIC — is still legible. Valerian,* who revived in his own person the ancient office of Censor, was at first so favourable toward the Christians that his house, says Dionysius of Alexandria, was filled with pious persons, and was, indeed, a congre- gation f of the Lord. This favour was doubtless the result of the Censor's approval of Christian influence on public morals. I In the latter part of his reign, how- ever, the Emperor passed under the dominion of the most abject superstition. Through the influence of Macrianus, a pagan bigot learned in the dark lore of Egypt, he became addicted to magic arts, and is said to have sought the auguries of the empire in the entrails of human victims. § The most relentless decrees were launched against the Christian church. The bishops, priests, and deacons were forthwith to be put to the sword; all others were to share the same fate, or to be * A. D 254-259. t 'E)£KA//Ti'n, Eii'ieb., vii, lo. X Milman, //ist. of Christianity, Am. ed., Book 11., chap vii. § Euseb., Jlist. Ecclcs , vii, lo. 84 The Catacombs of Rome. punished by exile and fetters.* The holding of assem- blies, or even entering the Christian cemeteries, was strictly prohibited A. D. 25 7. f By this unwonted inva- sion of the immemorial sanctity of the sepulchre the Christians were forbidden even these last refuges from persecution. Among the most illustrious victims of Valerian whose bodies lie in the lowly Catacombs, but whose names live for evermore, were Stephen I. and Sixtus II., bishops of the persecuted church, and a number of distinguished ecclesiastics, as well as many laymen of noble rank. % Stephen, as the head of the Christian community, was especially obnoxious to heathen rage. According to the Acts of his martyrdom he sought concealment in these sepulchral crypts, § where he was secretly visited by the faithful, and where he administered the sacraments. He was traced by the Roman soldiers to his subter- ranean chapel, but, awed by the mysterious rites, they allowed him to conclude the service in which he was engaged. He was then beheaded, with several of his adherents, || and buried in the Catacomb. * Ut episcopi et presbyteri et diacones incontinenter animadvertan- tur, . . . capite quoque mulctentur. — Cypr., ep. 72, ad Successum. I Ovdafib)^ e^sarac vfiiv ij cvv66ov(; ■KoLtWai 7} eif tll Kaluvfieva KOLvsTTjpia nouaai — Dionys., in Euseb., vii, II. Jussura est, ut nulla conciliabula faciant, neque coemeteria ingrediantur. — Pontius, Passio Cypriani. \ In Africa, Cyprian, the intrepid bishop of Carthage, after a stormy episcopate, obtained the crown of martyrdom. On receivin"- the sentence condemning him to death, he exclaimed, " God be thanked!" and went as joyous to his fate as to a marriage feast — Pontius, Passio Cypr . § " Vitam solitariam agebat in cryptis." Of St. Urban it is similar- ly said, " Solebat in sacrorum martyrum monumenta." — Acts of Cecilia. II Baronius : Ann., torn, iii, p. 76. Among his companions in death was Hippolytus, iu Roman convert, of whom a beautiful Icend Tlicir Origin and Early History. 85 Sixtus, the successor of Stephen, within a year re- ceived the martyr's crown. Like another Daniel setting at defiance the emperor's decree, he was leading the devotions of the persecuted flock in the Catacomb of Praetextatus, probably because it was less known than the public cemetery of Callixtus, when he was apprehended by the fierce soldiery, who had tracked his footsteps thither. He was hurried away to summary judgment, brought back to the place of his offence, and there be- headed, sprinkling with his blood the walls of the chamber. With him were also executed four of his deacons,* the monuments of two of whom, Agapetus and Felicissimus, De Rossi discovered in the very Catacomb in which they suffered. Sixtus himself was buried in the " Bishops' Tomb " in the Callixtan Cemetery, where the following inscription, fragments of which have been found in the debris, was afterward set up by Damasus : TEMPORE QVO GLADIVS SECVIT PI A VISCERA MATRIS KIC POSITVS RECTOR COELESTIA IVSSA DOCKBAM ADVENIVNT SVBITO RAPIVNT QVI FORTE SEDEN'TEM MILITIBVS MISSIS POPVLI TVNC COLLA DEDERE MOX SIBI COGNOVIT SE.NIOR QVIS TOLLERE VELEET PALMAM SEQVE SVVMQVE CAPVT PRIOR OBTVLIT IPSE I.MPATIE.NS EERITAS POSSET NE LAEDERE QVEMQVAM OSTENDIT CHRISTVS REDDIT QVI PRAEMIA VITAE PASTORIS MERITVM NVMERVM GREGIS IPSE TVETVR is recorded. His pagan relatives, entrusted with the secret of his re- treat, supplied his wants by means of their children, a boy and girl of ten and thirteen years. He one day detained the children in the hope that their parents would seek them, and thus have the oppor- tunity of religious instruction from the good bishop. His plan succeeded, and eventually they with their children were baptized and suffered martyrdom together ! Baron., Ann., iii, 69. Even though unauthentic, this story is a type, doubtless, of many incidents which occurred in the strange social relations of the church in the Catacombs. * Xistum in cimiterio animadversum sciatis . . . et cum eo diac- onos quatuor. — Cypr., Epis., Kxx, m/ ■'inrressiiin. S6 TJie Catacombs of Rome. At the time when the sword pierced the tender heart of the Mother [church,] I, the ruler buried liere, was teaching the laws of heaven. Suddenly came [the enemy,] who seized me sitting as I was. Then the people presented their necks to the soldiers sent against me. Soon the old man saw who sought to bear away the palm, and was the first to offer himself and his own head, that impa- tient rage might injure no one else. Christ wlio bestows the rewards of life, manifests the merit of the pastor : he himself defends the flock.* Thus seven bishops of the church at Rome fell in succession by the hand of the headsman, five of them in the space of eight years — heroic athletes of Christ who, at the very seat of paganism, as in a mighty theatre of God, bore the brunt of persecution, and, conquering even in death, received the martyr's crown and palm. The accession of Gallienus f restored peace to the church. His decree granting complete religious tolera- tion, the restoration of confiscated ecclesiastical prop- erty, and permission to " recover what they called their cemeteries," J; won the gratitude of his Christian subjects. His character, however, by no means justified the epithet of " holy and pious emperor " bestowed by Dionysius of Alexandria.! This was the first formal recognition of Christianity as a religio licita, ox legalized faith, and for forty years the church enjoyed comparative repose ; at * Another martyr whose Acts, although disfigured with some gro- tesque and exaggerated circumstances, contain elements of great lieauty, was Lawrence, a deacon of the bishop Sixtus. Esteeming it no sacrilege, but rather the highest consecration of the property of the church, he distributed it in alms among the suffering Christians. Being commanded to surrender to the emperor the confiscated ecclesiastical treasure, he presented to the commissioner a number of aged and impotent poor, saying, " These are the treasures of the cluirch." After incredible tortures, which form the subject of many a picture of Roman Catholic art, he is said to have been roasted to death over a slow fire. Ambros., Officin., i, 41. f A. D, 259. X Kuseb., Hist. EccUs., viii, 13. § lb., viii, zi^. Their Origin and Early History. 8y least such repose as was possible while twenty rival emperors — fantastic things " that likeness of a kingly crown had on " — struggled for the supremacy, and har- ried the land with their mutual devastations. During this period, Felix, the bishop of the Roman church, who, according to the Ziier Pontificalis, was exceedingly diligent in honouring the martyrs of the Catacombs, be- came himself a conscript of that noble army, and was beheaded, in accordance with an imperial decree, as was also Agapetus, a Christian of noble rank. The mild and amiable Tacitus * ruled over a turbulent people only six months. His brother Florian retained the purple only half that time. Probus, " the just," whose name, says his epitaph, expressed his character,! , fell by the hands of his own tumultuous legionaries. The sensual and abominable Carinus displayed the ex- travagancies of Heliogabalus, aggravated by the cruelty of Domitian. In his reign died Eutychianus, whose epitaph and title— EYTYXIANOC EHIC— have been found in the " Papal Crypt " of Callixtus. % Christianity was destined to undergo a final ordeal * A. D. 275. t Probus et vere probus situs est. Obiit A. D. 2S3. X Gregory of Tours, writing in the sixth century, asserts that under Numerian, the brother and contemporary of Carinus, Chrysanthus and Daria suffered martyrdom in a Catacomb on the Via Salaria. A number of the faithful being observed to visit their tombs, the emperor ordered the entrance to be built up and covered with a he.ap of sand and stones, that they might be buried alive in conunon mar- tyrdom. When their remains were discovered by Damasus, in the fourth century, he refrained from removing them, and simply made an opening from an adjacent gallery, that pilgrims to the early shrines of the faith might behold, without disturbing it, this "Christian Pompeii." Gregory asserts that these intere:,ting relics were still to be seen in his 'day — the skeletons of men, women, and children lying on the floor, and even the silver vessels {nrcei ari^eiila) which they used. 88 The Catacombs of Rotne. before it should ascend the throne of the Cassars. The church must pass once more through the purifying flames of persecution before it was fit to be entrusted with the reins of empire. The long peace and temporal prosperity had fostered pride and luxury, and relaxed the morals of the Christian community. Schisms and feuds destroyed the unity of the faith, and the bishops had begun to aspire to temporal power, and to assert an unwarranted authority. " Prelates inveighed against prelates," says Eusebius, " and people rose against people, assailing each other with words as with darts and spears."* The blasts of adversity were necessary to winnow the spurious and false away, and to leave the tried and true behind. From the fatal slumber of re- ligious apathy into which the church was falling it was to be rudely awakened. Its former afflictions sank into insignificance compared with this great tribulation, which was pre-eminently called The Persecution by the his- torian of the times. f The close of the third century witnessed the strange spectacle of the government of the Roman world by a group of men who had climbed to the giddy height of power from the lowest stations in life. Diocletian, originally a slave, or at least the son of a slave, reduced the haughty aristocracy of Rome to a condition of oriental servility. Maximian, a Pannonian peasant, be- trayed the savageness of his nature by his bloodthirsty cruelty. Galerius, an Illyrian herdsman, but exhib- ited more conspicuously upon the throne of empire the native barbarity of his character. Constantius was of nobler birth than any of his colleagues, and he alone adorned his lofty station by dignity, justice, and clem- ency. The world groaned under the oppression of its * Eiiseh., /fist, Eccles., viii, I. \ IbiJ^ Tlicir Origin and Early History. 8g cruel masters. So exhausting were tlieir exactions that none remained to tax, says Lactantius,* but the beggars. The early years of the reign of Diocletian were char- acterized for the most part by principles of religious tol- eration. Indeed, his wife and daughter, the empresses Prisca and Valeria, favoured, if they did not adopt, the Christian faith, and some of the first officers of the imperial household belonged to the now powerful sect.f But even during this period the Christians were not free from danger. Caius, the Roman bishop, is said to have lived for eight years in the Catacombs on account of the persecution, and at last underwent martyrdom in the year A. D. 2g6.'l Marcus and Marcelianus, two Roman Christians of noble rank, who have given their name to one of the Catacombs, suffered about this time. Others, especially in the army, where the ancient faith had firmest hold, and where, indeed, Eusebius says, the persecution began, § endured martyrdom as the valiant soldiers of Christ. The storm, of which these events were the precursors, at length burst with fury on the Christians in the year 303. A series of cruel edicts, written, says Eusebius, with a dagger's point, |1 were fulminated for the extirpation of the Christian name. ^ * Di Mart. Persec, c. xxiii. t Euseb., Hist. Ecclcs., viii, 1. X Caius . . , fugienspersecutionem Diocletiani in cryptis habitando, martyrio coronatur. — Lib. Poiitif.; cf. Euseb., Hist. Eccles., vii, 32. § 'E/c rCv £v oTpaTtiaig ud£}.6Liv KarapxofLevov tov fituyfitiv. — Hist. EccUs., viii, i. II Vita Const., ii, 54. K The following inscription, found in Spain, and given by Gruter, seems designed as the funeral monument of dead and buried Chris- tianity. But though apparently destroyed, like its divine Author, in- stinct with immortality it rose triumphant over all its foes. DIOCLETIAN . CAES • AUG • GALERIO ■ IN ORIENTF. ■ ADOPT -SVPER STITIONE CHRIST -VBIQ- DELETA ET CVLTV DEOR • I'ROPAGATO • "To Diocletian, Cresar Augustus, having adopted f Valerius in Ihe go The Catacombs of Rome. They were framed with malignant ingenuity, so as to leave no chance of escape save in open apostasy. All ecclesiastical property was confiscated. The churches were razed to the ground, and the sacred scriptures burned with fire.* All assemblies for worship were prohibited on pain of death. The clergy of every order were zeal- ously sought out, and thrust into dungeons designed for the worst of felons, f The whole Christian com- munity was outlawed, degraded from every secular office, deprived of the rights of citizenship, and exposed to the punishment of the vilest slaves. With intensifying vio- lence edict followed edict, like successive strokes of thunder in a raging storm. A universal and relentless proscription of the Christian name took place. The truculent monster Galerius, of whom his Christian sub- jects said, that he never supped without human blood, J proposed that all who refused to sacrifice to the gods should be burned alive ; and the fiendish ingenuity of the persecutors was exhausted in devising fresh tortures for their victims. In Italy, and especially at Rome, the work of de- struction was eagerly carried on by Maximian, an implacable enemy of the Christians ; and after his death by the abominable voluptuary Maxentius, in whom the twin passions of cruelty and lust struggled for the mas- East, the Christian superstition being every-where destroyed, and the worship of the gods extended." * Euseb., Hist. Eceles., viii, 2. The effects of the persecution were felt even in Britain. (Gildas, de Excitl. Britnn., m Bingham, viii, i.) Ailjan was the first British martyr at a somewhat earlier date. t *' The dungeons destined for murderers," says Eusebius, "were filled with bishops, presbyters, deacons, readers, and exorcists, so that there was no room left for those condemned for crime." — Ilist. IZccles. \ Nee unquam sine cruore humano cccnabat. — I.actan., de A/ort, Persec. Tlicir Origin and Early History. gi tery. These monsters of iniquity revelled in a carnival of blood, and glutted the Catacombs with victims, some of the most illustrious of whom will shortly be men- tioned. On the retirement of Diocletian, satiated with slaughter and weary with the cares of state, to his re- treat at Salonica, Galerius continued ,the persecution with increased zeal. It was the expiring effort of pagan- ism, the death throes of its mortal agony. But the Christian religion, like the trodden grass that ranker grows, flourished still in spite of the oppression it en- dured. Like the rosemary and thyme, which the more they are bruised give out the richer perfume, it breathed forth the odours of sanctity which are fragrant in the world to-day. Though the frail and the fickle fell off in the blast of adversity, the staunch and true remained ; and from the martyr's blood, more prolific than the fabled dragon's teeth, a new host of Christian heroes rose, contending for the martyr's starry and unwither- ing crown. But the period of deliverance was at hand. Smitten by the power of that God whose titles and attributes he had usurped, the wretched Galerius, amid the agonies of a loathsome disease, implored the intercessions of the Christians whom he had so ruthlessly proscribed. With sublimest magnanimity the church exhibited the nobil- ity of a Gospel revenge, and obeyed the injunction of its divine Master to pray for those who persecuted and despitefully used it. From the dying couch of the re- morseful monarch came an abject apology for his cruel deeds; and, in late atonement for his crime, a decree of amplest recognition of Christianity, and restoration of the right to worship God. Like the trump of jubilee, the edict of deliverance pealed through the land. It penetrated the gloomy duncjeon, tlie darksome mine, 92 The Catacombs of Rome. the catacomb's dim labyrinth ; and from their sombre depths vast processions of the " noble wrestlers of re- ligion"* thronged to the long forsaken churches with grateful songs of praise to God. But this treacherous calm was soon to be again broken. The superstitious tyrant Maximin endeavoured to revive the dying paganism, and to renew the persecution. He paid Christianity the high compliment of attempting a complete organization of the heathen priesthood on the model of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, and restored the ancient worship with unwonted pomp. He prohibited the assemblies in the cemeteries, and reiterated the edict of extermination against the Christians, f But the loathsome death of this brutal voluptuary soon delivered the church from the most implacable of its foes. From the distant island of Britain — that ultimate far Thule of the empire — had arrived the Caesar who should en- throne the new faith on the seat of its persecutors, and establish it as the religion of the state, J an event more perilous to its purity and spiritual power than the direst op])ression it had ever endured. Constan- tine having overcome the enemies of Christianity, who were also his own, became its protector, more, it is easy to believe, either from conviction of its truth or from policy than on account of the alleged miraculous vision of the cross of Christ, the presage of a bloody * Date of Edict, April 30, A. D. 311. Euseb., Hist. Eccles., ix, \. t Eusebius gives the edict, taken from a brazen tablet at Tyre, in which the Emperor speaks of "the votaries of an execrable vanity, like a funeral pile long disregarded and smothered, again rising in mighty flames and rekindling the extinguished brands." Hist. Ecclfs., ix, 9. \ The courtly panegyrist of Constantine gratefully speaks of him as a "light and deliverer arising in the dense and impenetrable dark- ness of a gloomy night." Euseb., Hist. F.cchs , .\, S. Their Origin and Early History. 93 victory.* He issued at Milan, A. D. 313, that decree of full and unlimited toleration f which became thence- forth the charter of the church's liberties. % * Eusebius compares the victory of the Milvian Bridge to that of Moses and the Israelites over Pharaoh and his hosts. Hist. Eccles. ix, 9. t Daremus et Christianis et omnibus liberam potestatem sequen- di reiigionem quam quisque voluisset— " We give to the Christians, and to all, the free choice to follow whatever mode of worship they may wish." — Decree of Milan, preserved in Lactantius, nVyJ/uz-A /V^-jfc, and in Euseb., Hist. F.rcles., x, 5. X In the violent deaths or loathsome diseases of many of their per- secutors the Christians recognized the retributive judgments of the Almighty, which were considered so remarkable as to occasion the special treatise de Aforlibiis Perseciitoyum, attributed to the pen of Lactantius. Nero died ignominiously by his own hand. Domitian was assassinated. During the reign of .JLUrelius war, famine, and pestilence wasted the land. Decius perished miserably in a marsh, and his body became the prey of the prowling jackal and unclean buzzard. Valerian, captured by the Persians, after having served as a footstool to his haughty foe, is said to have been flayed alive and his skin stuffed with straw. Aurelian was slain by the hand of a trusted servant, and Carinus by the dagger of u husband whom he had irreparably wronged. Diocletian, having languished for years the prey of painful maladies, which even affected his reason, it is said committed suicide. Galerius, like those rivals in bloodshed and persecution, Herod and Philip II., became an object of loathing and abhorrence, being "eaten of worms" while yet alive. Maximian fell by the hand of the public executioner ; and Maxentius, in the hour of defeat, was smothered in the ooze of the Tiber beneath the walls of his capital. Severus opened his own veins and bled to death. The first Maximin was murdered ; the second, a fugitive and an exile, committed suicide by poison, and, according to Eusebius, was so con- sumed by internal torments that "his body became tlie tomb of his soul." Licinius, the last of the persecutors, was slain by his ferocious soldiery, and his name, by a decree of the Senate, forever branded with infamy. Thus with indignities and tortures often surpassing those they inflicted on their Christian subjects, perished the enemies of the church of God, as if pursued by a divine retribution no less inexorable than the avenging Nemesis of the pagan mythology. See Lactantius. dc I\lort. Persec.^ passim ; Euseb., Hist. Eccles.^ viii, 17 ; ix, g, 10 ; Tertul., .Id. Scnp., c. 3. 94 The Catacombs of Rome. The sufferings of the more ilkistrlous victims of perse- cution are alone recorded in history, which is silent con- cerning the great army of unknown martyrs, whose names are recorded only in the Book of Life. The bishops of the church were ever the first to feel the tyrants' rage. The episcopal chair was often but the stepping-stone to the scaffold. Yet faithful shepherds were not wanting to lead the flock of Christ, and to testify their devotion to their trust by the sacrifice of their lives. We have seen how Caius suffered even before the final outbreak of persecution. Marcellinus, his successor, incurred the resentment of the tyrant Maxentius, was degraded to the office of groom of the public stables, where the horses of the circus were kept, and soon sank beneath the weight of his miseries and those of the church.* Marcellus, sometimes confounded with Marcellinus, paid the penalty of exile for his firmness in maintaining the ecclesiastical discipline against those who apostatized from the faith in those times of fiery trial. This event is recorded in the Damasine inscription : VERIDICVS RECTOR LAPSOS QVIA CRIMINA FLERE PRAEDIXIT MISERIS FVIT OMNIBVS HOSTIS AMARVS HrNC FVROR HINC ODIVM SEQVITVR DISCORDIA LITES SEDITIO CAEDES SOLVVNTVR FOEDERA PACIS CRIMEN OB ALTERIVS CHRI3TVM QVI IN PACE NEGAVIT FINIBVS EXPVLSV3 PATRIAE EST FERITATE TYRANNI IIAEC BREVITER DAMASVS VOLVIT COMPERTA REFERRE MARCELLI VT POPVLVS MERITVM COGNOSCERE POSSET.f * The church of St. Marcello, in the Corso, comiiiemorates the scene of his indignities. There is reason to believe that each church or litulus within the city had its own cemetery without the walls, over which the presbyter of the title had jurisdiction. Marcellinus, as bishop, had charge of the ecclesiastical Cemetery of Callixtus as appears from a contemporary inscription. f Gruter, Iiiscrip., p. 1172, No. 3. Their Origin and Early History. 95 The truth-speaking ruler, because he preached that the lapsed should weep for their crimes, was bitterly hated by all those unhappy ones. Hence fury, hence liatred followed, discord, contentions, sedi- tion, and slaughter ; and the bonds of peace were ruptured. For the crime of another, who in a time of peace had denied Christ, he was expelled the shores of his country by the cruelty of the tyrant. These things Damasus having learned, was desirous to relate briefly, thiit the people might recognize the merit of Marcellus. Neither Marcellus nor Marcellinus was buried in the Catacomb of Callixtus — which, as Diocletian had con- fiscated all the public cemeteries, was inaccessible to the Christians — but in the private crypt of the Christian matron Priscilla, on the Salarian Way. Eusebius, the successor of Alarcellus, was also banished on account of the controversy concerning the " lapsed." New light has recently been thrown on this subject by De Rossi's discovery, in the tomb of the bishop, of the following Damasine inscription in a fragmentary condition : HERACLIVS VETVIT LABSOS \sic] PECCATA DOLERE EVSEBIVS MISEROS DOCVIT SVA CRIMINA FLERE SCINDITVR [in] PARTES P0PVL03 GLISCE.MTE FVRORE SEDITIO CAEDES EELLVM DISCORDIA LITES EXTEMPLO PARITER PVLSI FERITATE TYRANNI INTEGRA CVM RECTO!!. SERVARET FOEDERA PACIS PERTVLIT EXILIV.M DOMINO SVB IVDICE LAETVS LITORE TRI.V ACRIOMVNDVM VITAMQ • RELIQUIT. Heraclius forbade the lapsed to grieve for their sins. Eusebius taught those unhappy ones to weep for their crimes. The people were rent in parties, and with increasing fury began sedition, slaughter, fighting, discord, and strife. Straightway botii were banished by the cruelty of the tyrant, although the ruler was preserving the bonds of peace inviolate. He bore his exile with joy, looking to the Lord as his Judge, and on the Trinacrian shore gave up the world and his life. The Heraclius mentioned in the inscription is proba- bly the heretical leader referred to in the epitaph of Marcellus, previously given. No reference to this event occurs in any of the ecclesiastical writers, and this g6 Tlie Catacombs of Rome. inscription, says Dr. Northcote, is the recovery of a lost chapter in the history of the church.* The remains of Eusebius were brought from Sicily, the place of his exile, by his successor, Melchiades, and interred in the Catacomb of Callixtus, but not with the other bishops, the approaches to whose tomb were blocked up with earth, probably to prevent its violation by the enemies of the faith. Melchiades, with whom the long suc- cession of Rome's martyr bishops comes to a close, was the last of his order who was buried in the Catacombs, and De Rossi conjectures that he has discovered in the Cemetery of Callixtus his tomb, and the very sarcopha- gus in which he lay.f One of the most illustrious of the lay martyrs of the Diocletian persecution was the gallant young soldier Sebastian, who has given his name to one of the most ancient basilicas of Rome and to the adjacent Cata- comb, and Adauctus, a treasurer of the imperial palace. In the Damasine epitaph of the latter occur the fine lines : INTEMERATA FIDE CONTEMPTO PRINXIPE MVNDI CONFESSVS XRM CAELEST[A REG.NA PETtSTI. % With unfaltering faith, despising the lonl of Ihe world, having confessed Chfist, thou didst seek the celestial realms. * Rom. Salt., p. 172. + There is a pleasing tradition recorded of Sylvester, the successor of Melchiades, to the effect that, having fled, on account of the per- secution, to the caverns of Mount Soracte, the Emperor Constantino sent for him to receive religious instruction. Seeing the soldiers ap- [jroach, as he thought to lead him to martyrdom, Sylvester exclaimed, *' Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation," but was ill a few days installed as bishop of Rome in the imperial palace of tlie Lateran. Soracte, once sacred to Apollo and the Muses, but now to Christ and the saints, is known, m commemoration of this event, as MottU San Silvestro, X Gruter, p. 1171, No. 8. Tluir Origin and Early History. 97 Several of the Christian cemeteries receive their des- ignation from the martyrs of this period, among others those of Saints Agnes, Peter, and Marcellinus, of.Pan- cratius, Generosa, Zeno, Soteris, and Quattro Incoronati, notice of whom will be more appropriate in the accounts of their respective sepulchres. History has also pre- served the names of many other valiant coniessors, who proved faithful even unto death amid the fiery trials and cruel mockings and scourgings to which they were exposed. Among these may be mentioned Cosmo and Damian, two holy brothers of Cilicia, who practised in Rome with great skill the healing art, from pure love to God and to their fellow-men, refusing to receive aught for their services ; * Simplicius and Faustinus, who were drowned in the Tiber by the tyrant's orders, and their martyred sister Beatrice, whose tombs and epitaphs De Rossi believes he has recovered.! Most of the legends, however, of what may be called the Romish mythology are disfigured by absurd and superstitious additions; and the martyrs themselves have become the objects of idolatrous veneration far alien from the spirit of that primitive Christianity for which they died. J * Their names and piety are commemorated by two churches in Rome. Eusebius also records with approbation the story of the Christian matron Sophronia, wife of the Prefect of Rome, who com- mitted suicide to escape the polluting embraces of the tyrant Max- entius. Hist. Ecctes., viii, 14. \ Bullettino, January, 1869, X The following satirical remarks of JDe Brosses, u. Romanist writer, concerning the supply of relics from the Catacomb of St. Agues, will indicate how unauthentic are these objects of veneration : " Vous pourriez voir ici la capitale des Catacombes de toute la chretientti. Les martyrs, les confesseurs, et les vierges, y fourmillent de tous cotes. Quand on se fait besoin de quelques reliques en pays etranger, le Pape n'a qu'a descendre ici et crier, Qui de vous aiitres vsut aller itre saint en Pologne ? Alors s'il se trouve quelque mort de bonne volonte il se leve et s'en va." 98 The Catacombs of Rome. The following inscriptions from the Catacombs are the only records of the victims of persecution whose names they bear. ^ HmftWh TsSm Fig. 21.— Lannus, the martyr of Christ, rests here. He suf- fered under Diocletian. For his successors also. ■p) PRIMITIVS IN PACE QVI POST MVLTAS ANGVSTIAS FORTISSIMVS MARTYR F.T VIXIT AN'NOS P ■ M • XXXVIII CONl VG • SVG PERDVLCISSIMO EENEMERENTI FECIT. Primitius in peace, after many torments, a most valiant martyr. He lived thirty-eight years, more or less. [His wife] raised this to her dearest husband, the well-deserving. HIC GORDIANVS GALUAE NVNCIVS IVGVLATVS PRO FIDE CVM FAMILIA TOTA QVIESCVNT IN PACE THEOPHILA ANCILLA FECIT. Here lies Gordianus, deputy of Gaul, who was executed for the faith, with all his family : they rest in peace. Theophila, a hand- maid, set up this.* * From the Catacomb of St. Agnes. The ancient Martyrology re- cori\s the conversion of a Roman noblem.in of this name in tlie time Tlicir Origin and Early History. 99 The history of the Catacombs is inextricably inter- woven with that of Christianity. Their very structure reflects the character of the times in which they were made. The absence of constraint or conceahnent, and the superior construction and ornamentation of those belonging to the earliest times, indicate the comparative security of the church before it had awakened the jealousy or fear of the Roman emperors. Their im- mense extension and crowded galleries testify to the; rapid increase of the Christian community. The altered character which they gradually assumed, the obstructed passages, the masked entrances, devious windings, and devices for concealment or escape, and the rudely scratched inscriptions and uncouth paintings, betray the sense of fear and the kindling rage of persecution which pursued the hunted Christians to these subterraneous sanctuaries of the faith. Their greater magnificence and more ornate structure, the costly mosaics, the marble stairways, and richly carved sarcophagi of the later ages, tell of the enthronement of Christianity on the seat of the Caesars, and of the homage paid to the relics and shrines of the saints and martyrs. And their debased architecture, barbarous paintings, and progressive ruin during the later years of their history indicate the grad- ual eclipse of art, and their final abandonment. We must therefore carefully determine at least the proximate date of any particular feature if we would correctly in- terpret its significance. of Julian, together with that of his wife and fifty-three members of his household, and his subsequent martyrdom and burial in the Cata- combs. It is probable that Theophila had learned in Gaul to write Latin, though only in those singular Crreek characters which, as Julius Caesar informs us, were u'^cd in that country, and that, after the death of the whole family, she employed some equally unlettered stone-mason to engrave this remarkable inscription. 130 The Catacombs of R..inc. The last and most terrible persecution of the church before its final triumph left abundant evidence of its violence and lengthened duration in the changes which contemporaneously took place in the Catacombs. God prepared a place for his saints, and hid them in the clefts of the rock as in the hollow of his hand. When the public observance of Christianity was proscribed by law the believers withdrew from the light of day, and in the inmost and darkest recesses of these subterranean crypts, by the graves of their martyred dead, enjoyed the con- solation of religious worship, and broke the bread and drank the wine in memory of their dying Lord.* But after the decree of Valerian which forbade the entering or holding any assemblies in the Christian cem- eteries, even these retreats were not safe, and the last sanctuaries of the faith were unscrupulously invaded. Persecution relentlessly followed the Christians through the labyrinthine windings of the Catacombs, and vio- lated the sepulchres of the sainted dead by sacrilegious tumult and bloodshed. Sometimes the heathen soldiery, fearing to pursue their victims into these unknown pas- sages, blocked up the entrance to prevent their escape; and many were thus buried alive and perished of hunger in these chambers of gloom. f An entire change in the construction of the Cata- combs now took place. They became obviously de- signed for purposes of safety and concealment. The new galleries were less wide and lofty, and the locull more crowded on account of the greater difficulty of "^ De Rossi gives several dated inscriptions of the reign of Diocle- tian, (Nos. i6 to 28,) thus absolutely identifying the age of those portions of the Catacombs. f In Hawthorne's ".Marble Faun" there is a fantastic legend of " The Spectre of the Catacombs," the ghost of an apostate betrayer of the Chriatian-;, which still haunts the scene of its liateful perfidy. Their Origin and Early History. lOI removing the excavated material. At this time, too, many of the lower /z'a/z/ were made for additional graves and greater secrecy. The main entrances were blocked up and the stairways demolished. Sometimes entire galleries were filled with earth, the removal of which is the chief obstacle to modern exploration, or were built up with masonry to obstruct pursuit ; and means of escape were provided, in case of forcible invasion of these re- treats. A striking example of this occurs in the Cata- comb of Callixtus. The ancient stairway was partially destroyed, the entrance completely obstructed, and some of the galleries walled up. Narrow passages for escape were made connecting with an adjacent arenarium, jWilliJfriiir' Fig. 22.— Secret stairway into Arenarium. and a very narrow secret stairway constructed from the roof of the latter to the surface of the ground, as shown in the section above, which stairway could only be reached by a movable ladder connecting it with the floor.* * See plan of this areitariuiii and stairway in chap, v, fie;. 26. I02 The Catacombs of Rome. It is impossible that the mass of the Christian commu- nity, or even any considerable proportion of it, could ever have taken refuge in these subterraneous crypts. Their vast extent and the number of chambers would indeed permit a great multitude to remain concealed for a time in their depths ; but the difficulty of procuring a regular supply of food, the confined atmosphere, and the p^rob- able exhalation of noxious gases from the graves — espe- cially on the opening of a bisomus, or double tomb, for its second inmate — seem insuperable obstacles. As it was the religious leaders of the Christian community who were especially obnoxious to those in power, they would be the most likely to seek concealment in the Catacombs, not from inferiority of courage, but, like the afterward martyred Cyprian, that they might the better guide and govern the persecuted church. Hence the examples before given of bishops and other ecclesiastics lying hid- den, some for years, in these depths, and visited by the faithful for instruction or for the celebration of worship.* There is evidence, however, that during the exacerba- tions of persecution private Christians sought safety in these recesses, and, burrowing in their depths, evaded the pursuit of their enemies. Tertullian speaks of " a lady, unaccustomed to privation, trembling in a vault, apprehensive of the capture of her maid, upon whom she depends for her daily food." The heads of Chris- tian families, and those most obnoxious to the pagan authorities, would be especially likely to leave the fel- lowship of the living in order to live in security among the dead. Father Marchi conjectures that supplies of * In A. D. 359 Liberius, bishop of Rome, lay hid for a year in the Catacomb of .St. Aijiies, till the death of the Arian Constantius ; and in ,\. D. 418 Boniface I. in the Catacomb of St. Felicita';, durin" the usurpation of the antipope Eidalius. Tlieir Origin and Early History. 103 grain were laid up for the maintenance of the hidden fugitives, and De Rossi describes certain crypts in the Catacomb of Callixtus which were probably employed for storing corn or wine in time of persecution. Fre- quent wells occur, amply sufficient for the supply of water; and the multitude of lamps which have been found would dispel the darkness, while their sudden extinction would prove the best concealment from at- tack by their enemies.* Hence the Christians were stigmatized as a skulking, darkness-loving race, f who fled the light of day to burrow like moles in the earth. These worse than Dsedalian labyrinths were admi- rably adapted for eluding pursuit. Familiar with their intricacies, and following a well-known clew, the Chris- tian could plunge fearlessly into the darkness, where his pursuer would soon be ine.xtricably lost. Perchance the sound of Christian worship, and the softened cadence of the confessors' hymn, stealing through the distant corridors, may have fallen with strange awe on the souls of the rude soldiery stealthily approaching their prey ; and, perhaps, not unfrequenfly with a saving and sanc- tifying power. But sometimes, tracked by the sleuth- hounds of persecution, or betrayed' by some wretched apostate consumed by a Judas-greed of gold, the Chris- tians were surprised at their devotions, and their refuge became their sepulchre. Such was the tragic fate of Stephen, slain even while ministering at the altar; sucli the event described by Gregory of Tours, when a heca- tomb of victims were immolated at once by heathen hate ; such the peril which wrung from a stricken heart the cry, not of anger but of grief, Tevipora infausta, qui- * The similar excavations of Quesnel, in France, were long inhab- ited by both human beings and cattle. t Latebrosa et lucifiigax natio. — Sl/hiiic. Felix. 104 '^^'■^ Catacombs of Rome. bus inter sacra et vota ne in cavernis quidem salvari possi- mus ! — "O sad times in which, among sacred rites and prayers, even in caverns, we are not safe ! " It requires no great effort of imagination to conceive the dangers and escapes which must have been frequent episodes in the heroic lives of the early soldiers of the cross. In the Catacombs more safely than elsewhere could the Christians celebrate the ordinances of religion, often under cover of the rites of sepulture, which might even yet be sacred in the eyes of their enemies. And next to their funeral purposes this seems to have been their chief use. For this many of their principal cham- bers and chapels were excavated, supplied with seats, ventilated by luminari, and adorned with biblical or symbolical paintings. With what emotions must the primitive believers have held their solemn worship and heard the words of life, surrounded by the dead in Christ ! With what power would come the promise of the resurrection of the body, amid the crumbling relics of mortality ! How fervent their prayers for their com- panions in tribulation, when they themselves stood in jeopardy every hour ! Their holy ambition was to wit- ness a good confession even unto death. They burned to emulate the zeal of the martyrs of the faith, the plumeless heroes of a nobler chivalry than that of arms, the Christian athletes who won in the bloody conflicts of the arena, or amid the fiery tortures of the stake, not a crown of laurel or of bay, but a crown of life, starry and unwithering, that can never pass away. Their humble graves are grander monuments than the trophied tombs of Rome's proud conquerors upon the Appian Way. Lightly may we tread beside their ashes; rever- ently may we mention their names. Though the bodily presence of those conscripts of the tomb — the forlorn Their Origin and EaHy History. 105 hope of the army of Christianity — no longer walked among men, their intrepid spirit animated the heart of each member of that little community of persecuted Christians, "of whom the world was not worthy; who wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth, . . . being destitute, afflicted, tor- mented."* It is impossible to arrive at even an approximate esti- mate of the number of victims of the early persecutions. That number has sometimes, no doubt, been greatly ex- aggerated. It has also, in defiance of the testimony of contemporary history, been unreasonably minified. f Tacitus asserts that under Nero a great multitude J were convicted and punished. Pliny says the temples were almost deserted § through this contagious super- stition. Juvenal, Martial, and other classical authors, notice the extraordinary sufferings of the Christians. Cyprian, in the middle of the third century, says, " It is impossible to number the martyrs of Christ." ]| Euse- bius, an eye-witness of the last persecution, states that innumerable multitudes suffered during its prevalence. After describing their excruciating tortures, he adds : * Compare the following spirited lines of Bernis : " La terre avail gemi sous le far des tyrans ; Elle cachait encore des martyrs expirans, Qui dans les noirs detours des grottes reculdes Derobaient aux bourreaux leurs tetes mutilees." Po'eine de la Rtligioii Vengee, chap. viii. t See especially Uodwell's learned but unsatisfactory Essay, De Paiicitate Martyriim, and Gibbon's laboured extenuation of the sever- ity of the persecutors. X Ingens multitudo. — Ann., xv. § Jam desolata templa. — Epis., 97, lib. .x. II ICxuberante copia virtutis et fidei numerari non possunt martyres Chri^ti. — Lilt, de Exhort. A/nr/yr., c. xi. io6 The Catacombs of Rome. " And all these things were doing not for a few days, but for a series of whole years. At one time ten or more, then twenty, again thirty or even sixty, and sometimes a hundred men, with their wives and children, were slain in one day."* He also describes the destruction of a Christian town, with all its inhabitants, by fire, f Lac- tantius, also a contemporary witness, tells us that the Christians were often surrounded on all sides and burnt together. % It is very remarkable that so few martyrs' epitaphs have been found in the Catacombs, not more than five or six altogether, and some of these are not of unques- tioned genuineness. But this may be attributed to the humility and modesty of the early Christians, who shrank from claiming for the sufferers for the truth the august title of martyr, which they restricted to the one faithful and true witness, Jesus Christ. "We," said the victims of persecution at Lyons, " are only mean and humble confessors." There do occur, it is true, certain inscriptions of a memorial character and of later date than the time of the persecution, some of which commemorate a large number of martyrs, but they are of little or no historic value. Such is the inscription to three thou- sand martyrs in the Catacomb of Priscilla, already given, § and the following from the Callixtan Catacomb : MARCELLA ET CHRISTI MARTYRES CCCCL " Marcclla and four hundred and fifty martyrs in Christ." Ancient itin- eraries speak of eighty, or even eight hundred, martyrs buried in one spot in the Catacombs ; and Prudentius * Euseb., Hist. Eccles., viii, 9. f Hid.., viii 11. X Universum populum cum ipso pariter conventiciilo concvemavit. L.ictan., liistit. Divin., ,, 11: Clregatim amburebantur. — Il)iJ § rage 7S. Their Origin and Early History. 107 declares that he saw the remains of some sixty in a single grave.* But surpassing all the others in exaggera- tion is an inscription in the church of St. Sebastian commemorating one hundred and seventy-four thou- sand holy martyrs, and forty-six bishops, also martyrs, said to be interred in the neighbouring Catacomb. Another ancient tradition asserts that twelve thousand Christians, who were employed in building the Baths of Diocletian, were buried in the Catacomb of St. Zeno. f Piazza asserts that two hundred and eighty-five Chris- tians were put to death in two days, under the Emperor Claudius II., A. D. 268, and that more than two thou- sand were executed for refusing to sacrifice to the image of the sun. Indeed, some Roman archceologists discern in every palm branch or cup, which are so frequently found in the Catacombs, irrefragable evidence of the martyr's tomb. \ Such atrocious cruelty and lavish destruction of life * Sexaginta illic defossas mole sub una Reliquias memini me didicisse hominum. — Peristeph., xi. t The story of the martyrdom of ten thousand Christians on Mount Ararat, under Trajan, and of the massacre of the Thundering Legion, consisting of six thousand Christians, by Maximian, are fictions