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 CEMETERY

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CEMETERY

in reference to the Persian tiara of Sts. Abdon and Sennan. 7. Cemetery of Generosa. Generosa was a Roman lady who buried on her property the bodies of tin- martyrs Simplicius, Faustinas, and Beatrix, transferred later (683) to St. Bihiana, in the city. The cemetery, a poor rural one, is now famous for important inscriptions of the "Fratres Arvales" found there between 1858 and 1874. (Henzen, Acta fiat rum Arvalium quse supersunt, Berlin, 1874.) The cemetery probably grew up (Marucchi) from a neighbouring quarry whence later it took in the I wood of the ancient pagan brotherhood of the " \i\alos", who seem to have died off or removed elsewhere about the middle of the third century. An ancient basilica, built by St. Damasus, was also un- cart lied when the aforesaid inscriptions were dis- covered. As in most catacombs an overground cemetery grew up, which was used until the eighth century.

[II. Via OsTiENsra.— 8. Tomb of St. Paul. The body of St. Paul was buried on the Ostian Way, near the place of his martyrdom (adAq tas Salvias) on the property {in prcedio) of Lucina. a Christian matron. St. Anacietus. second successor of St. Peter, built a small memoria or chapel on the site, and about 200 the Roman priest Caius refers to it (Euseb., H.E.,ii, 25) as still standing. From 258 to 260 the body of St. Paul with that of St. Peter lay in the "Platonia" of St. Sebastian; in the latter year, probably, it was returned to its original resting-place. In the mean- time a cemetery had been growing in the aforesaid proedium of Lucina. Constantine replaced the little oratory oi Anacietus with B great basilica. I nder Gregory XVI, the sarcophagus of St. Paul was discovered, but not opened. Its fourth-century inscription bears the words paulo apost mart

(Paul, Apostle and Martyr). The museum of the modern basilica contains some very ancient epitaphs

from the aforesaid cemetery of Lucina, antedating

the basilica; two of them bear dates of 107 and 111. After these we must come down to 217, be- fore finding any consular date on a ( 'htistian epitaph. Dom Cornelio Villain proposed (190.5) to publish all the ancient Christian epitaphs found here. 9. Cemeten/ of • at a little distance from

that of Lucina. Commodilla is an unknown Christian matron, on whose property were buried Felix and Adauctu-. martyrs of the persecution of Diocletian.

I In- cemetery, once extensive, is now difficult of ac- ini its frescoes and inscriptions have disap- peared almost entirely. The open loculi are an

evidence of the pillage to which such cemeteries were once subject, 10. Tomb of St. Timothy. Timothy was possibly a priest of Antioch, martyred at Rome under Diocletian, and buried by the pious matron Thcona in her garden, not far from the body of St. Paul, " ut Paulo apostolo ut quondam Timotheus

adhareiel ". says the Martyrnlogy (22 May). De

Rossi identifies with this tomb a small cemetery dis-

l by him I 1872) in the \ igna Salviucci to the

let i ni tin Ostian Way. and opposite the apse of St.

Paul. 11. Cemetery of St. Thecla, discovered by Ar-

mellini in |s70. named from some unknown 1,'oiuan

Thecla. and certainly ant i to Constantine; an

epitaph of Amelia Agape has an early Christian savour and is cut on tin- back of a pagan epitaph of tin ! time of Claudius Gothicus (268 70T. 12. Cemetery of Aqua; Salinas. There was certainly a cemetery in early Christian timi the de-

capitation of Si. Paul now Tie I ontane i ; it probably bore tip Zeno. Farther on was the cem-

etery of St. CyriacUS, mentioned in the " Mirabilia

I'rbis Romas" and Been by Bosio at the end of the sixteenth century. Its exact site is no longer known.

Ostia itself, at the end of the road, had a remarkable Christian cemetery.

IV. Via Ardeatina, to the right of the Appian III — 33

Way; the ancient Porta Ardeatina between the

churches of St. Sabas and St. Balbina was destroyed in the sixteenth century to make way for the fortifi- cations of Sangallo. — 13. Cemetery of St. DomitiUa (Tor Marancia), the largest of all the Roman cata- combs known to Bosio, who thought it a part of Saint Callistus, and nearly perished (1593) in its depths.

It is the ancestral burial-pin i 1 lavia DomitiUa,

wife of the consul Flavins Clemens (95). She was exiled by Domitian for her Christian Faith to the island of Pontia; her faithful servants Nereus and AchilleUS, said to have been baptized by St. Peter, followed her into exile, were beheaded at Ter- racina. and their bodies brought bark to the family sepulchre of their mistress. In lS7:i l)e Rossi dis- covered the important ruins of the large three-nave basilica erected here between 390 and 395 in honour of these saints and of St. Petronilla, whose body was transferred thence to St. Peter's in the eighth century. At an earlier date (1865) he had the good fortune to discover, close to the highway, the primitive entrance to the cemetery, one of the most ancient Christian monuments. It is a spacious room or gallery, with four or five separate niches for as many sarcophagi, the walls finished in fine stucco, with classical decora- tions. On either side are similar edifices, a little later in date, but evidently used by the guardian of the monument and for the celebration of the Christian agapae or love-feasts. The sarcophagi, whole or

Original K

i,Y ni 1 >IIMITII.LA

fragmentary, the brick tiles, and the names on the epitaphs (Claudii, Flavii, Clpii. Aurelii) show that this hypogceum or "vestibule of the Flavians", as it is called, belongs to the early part of the second century. De Rossi believed it the tomb of the mar- tyred consul, Flavins ( 'lemcns (9.5. The site has suf- fered from the vandalism and greed of earlier visitors, but the frescoes yet extant exhibit great beauty of execution and a rich variety of Christian symbolism. "We are quite sure", say Northeote and Brownlow (I, 120-27), "that we have been hen- brought face to face with one of the earliest specimens of Christian subterranean burial in Rome; and it shows u the sense of liberty and security under which it was exe- cuted." Not far away was discovered in 1S7."> the famous epitaph of "Flavins Sabinus and his sister Titiana", possibly the children of Flavins Sabinus, brother of the Emperor Vespasian, mentioned by Taci- tus (Hist., III. 65) as a mild, but indolent and ai

man, terms that to so seem to make him out a

Christian and therefore the origin of the new religion among the Flavii. Quite near also are the touching third century inscriptions of M. Antoni "sibi el suis fidentibus in Domino", i. e. for himself and his own who trust in Cod; likewise the very an- cient and fine crypt of Ampliatus, whom De Rossi iden- tifies with the Ampliatus of] ri, 8. Not to speak of numerous dogmatic epitaphs, the cemetery of DomitiUa is famous for a beautiful third-century Adoration of the Ma r in number, and for

the venerable second-century i lallion of Sts. Peter

and Paul, the oldest known monument of Christian portraiture, and a signal proof of their simultaneous