Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 by Various

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The older catacombs, whose narrow graves had been filled during the last
quarter of the third century with the bodies of many new martyrs, were
now less used for the purposes of burial, and more for those of worship.
New chapels were hollowed out in their walls; new paintings adorned the
brown rock; the bodies of martyrs were often removed from their original
graves to new and more elaborate tombs; the entrances to the cemeteries
were no longer concealed, but new and ampler ones were made; new
stairways, lined with marble, led down to the streets beneath;
_luminaria_, or passages for light and air, were opened from the surface
of the ground to the most frequented places; and at almost every
entrance a church or an oratory of more or less size was built, for the
shelter of those who might assemble to go down into the catacombs, and
for the performance of the sacred services upon ground hallowed by so
many sacred memories. The worship of the saints began to take form, at
first, in simple, natural, and pious ways, in the fourth century; and
as it grew stronger and stronger with the continually increasing
predominance of the material element in the Roman Church, so the
catacombs, the burial-places of the saints, were more and more visited
by those who desired the protection or the intercession of their
occupants. St. Jerome, who was born about this time in Rome, [A.D. 331,]
has a curious passage concerning his own experiences in the catacombs.
He says: "When I was a boy at Rome, being instructed in liberal studies,
I was accustomed, with others of the same age and disposition, to go on
Sundays to the tombs of the apostles and martyrs, and often to go into
the crypts, which, being dug out in the depths of the earth, have for
walls, on either side of those who enter, the bodies of the buried; and
they are so dark, that the saying of the prophet seems almost fulfilled,
_The living descend into hell._" But as the chapels and sacred tombs
in the catacombs became thus more and more resorted to as places for
worship, the number of burials within them was continually growing
less,--and the change in the spirit of the religion was marked by the
change of character in the paintings and inscriptions on their walls.
By the middle of the fifth century the extension of the catacombs had
ceased, and nearly about the same time the assemblies in them fell off.
The desolation of the Campagna had already begun; Rome had sunk rapidly;
and the churches and burial-places within the walls afforded all the
space that was needed for the assemblies of the living or the dead.

When the Goths descended upon Italy, ravaging the country as they passed
over it, and sat down before Rome, not content with stripping the land,
they forced their way into the catacombs, searching for treasure, and
seeking also, it seems likely, for the bodies of the martyrs, whom their
imperfect creed did not prevent them from honoring. After they retired,
in the short breathing-space that was given to the unhappy city, various
popes undertook to do something to restore the catacombs,[D]--and one
of them, John III., [A.D. 560-574,] ordered that service should be
performed at certain underground shrines, and that candles and all else
needful for this purpose should be furnished from the Basilica of St.
John Lateran. Just at the close of the sixth century, Gregory the Great
[590-604] again appointed stations in the catacombs at which service
should be held on special days in the course of the year, and a curious
illustration of the veneration in which the relics of the saints were
then held is afforded by a gift which he sent to Theodelinda, queen of
the Lombards. At this time the Lombards were laying all Italy waste.
Their Arian zeal ranged them in religious hate against the Roman
Church,--but Theodelinda was an orthodox believer, and through her
Gregory hoped to secure the conversion of her husband and his subjects.
It was to her that he addressed his famous Dialogues, filled with
the most marvellous stories of holy men and the strangest notions of
religion. Wishing to satisfy her pious desires, and to make her a very
precious gift, he sent to her many phials of oil taken from the lamps
that were kept burning at the shrines of the martyrs in the catacombs.
It was the custom of those who visited these shrines to dip
handkerchiefs, or other bits of cloth, in the reservoirs of oil, to
which a sacred virtue was supposed to be imparted by the neighborhood of
the saints; and even now may often be seen the places where the lamps
were kept lighted.[E]

[Footnote D: An inscription set up by Vigilius, pope from A.D. 538 to
555, and preserved by Gruter, contains the following lines:--

"Dum peritura Getae posuissent castra sub urbe,
Moverunt sanctis bella nefunda prius,
Istaque sacrilego verterunt corde sepulchra
Martyribus quondam rite sacrata piis.
Diruta Vigilius nam mox haec Papa gemiscens,
Hostibus expulsis, omne novavit opus."]

[Footnote E: The phials sent by Gregory to Queen Theodelinda were
accompanied by a list of the shrines from which they were taken; among
them was that of St. Cecilia. The document closes with the words, "Quae
olea sca temporibus Domini Gregorii Papae adduxit Johannes indignus
et peccator Dominae Theodelindae reginae de Roma." The oils are still
preserved in the treasury of the cathedral at Monza,--and the list
accompanying them has afforded some important facts to the students of
the early martyrology of Rome. A similar belief in the efficacy of oils
burned in lamps before noted images, or at noted shrines, still prevails
in the Papal City. In a little pamphlet lying before us, entitled
_Historic Notices of Maria SSma del Parto, venerated in St. Augustine's
Church in Rome_, published in 1853, is the following passage: "Many who
visited Mary dipped their fingers in the lamps to cross themselves with
the holy oil, by the droppings from which the base of the statue was so
dirtied, that hanging-lamps were substituted in the place of those that
stood around. But that the people might not be deprived of the trust
which they reposed in the holy oil, bits of cotton dipped in it were
wrapped up in paper, and there was a constant demand for them among the
devout." This passage refers to late years, and the custom still exists.
Superstition flourishes at Rome now not less than it did thirteen
hundred years ago; and superstitious practices have a wonderful vitality
in the close air of Romanism.]

But although the memory of those who had been buried within them was
thus preserved, the catacombs themselves and the churches at their
entrances were falling more and more into decay. Shortly after Gregory's
death, Pope Boniface IV. illustrated his otherwise obscure pontificate
by seeking from the mean and dissolute Emperor Phocas the gift of the
Pantheon for the purpose of consecrating it for a Christian church. The
glorious temple of all the gods was now dedicated [A.D. 608, Sept. 15]
to those who had displaced them, the Virgin and all the Martyrs. Its new
name was S. Maria ad Martyres,--and in order to sanctify its precincts,
the Pope brought into the city and placed under the altars of his new
church twenty-eight wagon-loads of bones, collected from the different
catacombs, and said to be those of martyrs. This is the first notice
that has been preserved of the practice that became very general in
later times of transferring bodies and bones from their graves in the
rock to new ones under the city churches.

Little more is known of the history of the catacombs during the next
two centuries, but that for them it was a period of desolation and
desertion. The Lombard hordes often ravaged and devastated the Campagna
up to the very gates of the city, and descended into the underground
passages of the cemeteries in search of treasure, of relics, and of
shelter. Paul III., about the middle of the eighth century, took many
bones and much ashes from graves yet unrifled, and distributed them
to the churches. He has left a record of the motives that led him
to disturb dust that had rested so long in quiet. "In the lapse of
centuries," he says, "many cemeteries of the holy martyrs and confessors
of Christ have been neglected and fallen to decay. The impious Lombards
utterly ruined them,--and now among the faithful themselves the old
piety has been replaced by negligence, which has gone so far that even
animals have been allowed to enter them, and cattle have been stalled
within them." Still, although thus desecrated, the graves of the martyrs
continued to be an object of interest to the pilgrims, who, even in
these dangerous times, from year to year came to visit the holy places
of Rome; and itineraries, describing the localities of the catacombs
and of the noted tombs within them, prepared for the guidance of such
pilgrims, not later than the beginning of the ninth century, have
been preserved to us, and have afforded essential and most important
assistance in the recent investigations.[F]

[Footnote F: Four of these itineraries are known. One of them is
preserved in William of Malmesbury's _Chronicle_. The differences and
the correspondences between them have been of almost equal assistance in
modern days in the determination of doubtful names and localities.]

About the same time, Pope Paschal I. [A.D. 817-824] greatly interested
himself in searching in the catacombs for such bodies of the saints as
might yet remain in them, and in transferring these relics to churches
and monasteries within the city. A contemporary inscription, still
preserved in the crypt of the ancient church of St. Prassede, (a church
which all lovers of Roman legend and art take delight in,) tells of the
two thousand three hundred martyrs whose remains Paschal had placed
beneath its altars. Nor was this the only church so richly endowed. One
day, in the year 821, Paschal was praying in the church that stood on
the site of the house in which St. Cecilia had suffered martyrdom, and
which was dedicated to her honor. It was now one of the oldest churches
in Rome. Two centuries before, Gregory the Great, St. Gregory, had
restored it,--for it even then stood in need of repairs, and now it was
in greater need than ever. Paschal determined, while praying, that he
would rebuild it from its foundations; but with this determination came
the desire to find the body of the Saint, that her new church might not
want its most precious possession. It was reported that the Lombards had
sought for it and carried it away, and the knowledge of the exact place
of the grave, even, was lost. But Paschal entered vigorously on the
search. He knew that she had been buried in the Cemetery of St.
Callixtus, and tradition declared that her sepulchre had been made near
the Chamber of the Popes. There he sought, but his seeking was vain.

On a certain day, however,--and here he begins his own story,--in the
Church of St. Peter, as he sat listening to the harmony of the morning
service, drowsiness overcame him, and he fell asleep.[G] As he was
sleeping, a very beautiful maiden of virginal aspect, and in a rich
dress, stood before him, and, looking at him, said,--"We return thee
many thanks; but why without cause, trusting to false reports, hast thou
given up the search for me? Thou hast been so near me that we might have
spoken together."

[Footnote G: "Quadam die, dum ante Confessionem Beati Petri
Apostoli psallentium matutinali lucescente Dominica residentes
observaremus harmoniam, sopore in aliquo corporis fragilitatem
aggravaute."--_Paschalis Papae Diploma_, as quoted in _L'Histoire de
Sainte Cecile_, par l'Abbe Gueranger. The simplicity of the old Pope's
story is wofully hurt by the grandiloquence of the French Abbe: "Le
Pontife ecoutait avec delices l'harmonie des Cantiques que l'Eglise fait
monter vers le Seigneur au lever du jour. Un assoupissement produit par
la fatigue des veilles saintes vient le saisir sur le siege meme ou il
presidait dans la majeste apostolique," etc., etc., etc., _ad nauseam._]

The Pope, as if hurt by her rebuke, and doubtful of his vision, then
asked the name of her who thus addressed him.

"If thou seekest my name," she said, "I am called Cecilia, the
handmaiden of Christ."

"How can I believe this," replied the sleeping Pope, "since it was long
ago reported that the body of this most holy martyr was carried away by
the Lombards?"

The Saint then told him that till this time her body had remained
concealed; but that now he must continue his search, for it pleased God
to reveal it to him; and near her body he would also find other bodies
of saints to be placed with hers in her new-built church. And saying
this, she departed.

Hereupon a new search was begun, and shortly after, "by the favor of
God, we found her in golden garments, and the cloths with which her
sacred blood had been wiped from her wounds we found rolled up and full
of blood at the feet of the blessed virgin."

At the same time, the bodies of Valerian, Tiburtius, and Maximus were
found in a neighboring cemetery, and, together with the relics of Pope
Urban,--as well as the body of St. Cecilia,--were placed under the
high altar of her church.[H] The cypress coffin in which she had been
reverently laid at the time of her death was preserved and set within a
marble sarcophagus. No expense was spared by the devout Paschal to adorn
the church that had been so signally favored. All the Art of the time
(and at that time the arts flourished only in the service of the Church)
was called upon to assist in making the new basilica magnificent. The
mosaics which were set up to adorn the apse and the arch of triumph were
among the best works of the century, and, with colors still brilliant
and design still unimpaired, they hold their place at the present
day, and carry back the thought and the imagination of the beholder a
thousand years into the very heart of this old story. Under the great
mosaic of the apse one may still read the inscription, in the rude Latin
of the century, which tells of Paschal's zeal and Rome's joy, closing
with the line,

"Roma resultat ovans semper ornata per
aevum."

[Footnote H: It is a remarkable fact, to be explained by the believers
in the virtue of relics, that, notwithstanding the body of St. Cecilia
was deposited perfect in her grave, and, as we shall see, was long after
found complete, no less than five heads of St. Cecilia are declared
to exist, or to have existed,--for one has been lost,--in different
churches. One is in the church of the SS. Quattro Coronati, at Rome,
which possessed it from a very early period; a second is at Paris, a
third at Beauvais, a fourth was at Tours, and we have seen the reliquary
in which a fifth is preserved in the old cathedral of Torcello.]

And thus once more the body of the virgin was left to repose in peace,
once more the devout could offer their prayers to the Saint at the altar
consecrated by her presence, and once more the superstitious could
increase the number of the miracles wrought by her favor. Through the
long period of the fall and depression of Rome, her church continued to
be a favorite one with the people of the city, and with the pilgrims to
it. From time to time it was repaired and adorned, and in the thirteenth
century the walls of its portico were covered with a series of frescoes,
representing the events of St. Cecilia's life, and the finding of her
body by Paschal. These frescoes--precious as specimens of reawakening
Art, and especially precious at Rome, because of the little that was
done there at that period--were all, save one, long since destroyed
in some "restoration" of the church. The one that was preserved is now
within the church, and represents in its two divisions the burial of the
Saint by Pope Urban, and her appearance in St. Peter's Church to the
sleeping Paschal, whose figure is rendered with amusing naivete and
literalness.

Meanwhile, after the translation of St. Cecilia's body, the catacombs
remained much in the same neglected state as before, falling more and
more into ruin, but still visited from year to year by the pilgrims,
whom even pillage and danger could not keep from Rome. For two
centuries,--from the thirteenth to the fifteenth,--scarcely any mention
of them is to be found. Petrarch, in his many letters about Rome, dwells
often on the sacredness of the soil within the city, in whose crypts and
churches so many saints and martyrs lie buried, but hardly refers to the
catacombs themselves, and never in such a way as to show that they were
an object of interest to him, though a lover of all Roman relics and a
faithful worshipper of the saints. It was near the end of the sixteenth
century that a happy accident--the falling in of the road outside the
Porta Salara--brought to light the streets of the Cemetery of St.
Priscilla, and awakened in Antonio Bosio a zeal for the exploration of
the catacombs which led him to devote the remainder of his long life to
the pursuit, and by study, investigation, and observation, to lay
the solid basis of the thorough and comprehensive acquaintance with
subterranean Rome which has been extended by the researches of a long
line of able scholars down to the present day. But to Bosio the
chief honor is due, as the earliest, the most exact, and the most
indefatigable of the explorers.

It was during his lifetime that the story of St. Cecilia received a
continuation, of which he himself has left us a full account. In
the year 1599, Paolo Emilio Sfondrati, Cardinal of the Title of St.
Cecilia,[I] undertook a thorough restoration of the old basilica erected
by Paschal. He possessed a large collection of relics, and determined
that he would place the most precious of them under the high altar. For
this purpose the vault containing the sarcophagi in which St. Cecilia
and her companions lay must be opened, and on the 20th of October the
work was undertaken. Upon breaking through the wall, two sarcophagi of
white marble were discovered. The Cardinal was on the spot, and, in the
presence of numerous dignitaries of the Church, whom he had sent for as
witnesses, he caused the heavy top of the first of these stone coffins
to be lifted. Within was seen the chest of cypress-wood in which,
according to the old story, the Saint had been originally placed.
Sfondrati with his own hands removed the lid, and within the chest was
found the body of the virgin, with a silken veil spread over her rich
dress, on which could still be seen the stains of blood, while at her
feet yet lay the bloody cloths which had been placed there more than
thirteen centuries before. She was lying upon her right side, her feet a
little drawn up, her arms extended and resting one upon the other,
her neck turned so that her head rested upon the left cheek. Her form
perfectly preserved, and her attitude of the sweetest virginal grace and
modesty, it seemed as if she lay there asleep rather than dead.[J]--The
second sarcophagus was found to contain three bodies, which were
recognized as being, according to tradition, those of Tiburtius,
Valerian, and Maximus.

[Footnote I: The _Titoli_ of Rome correspond nearly to Parishes. They
date from an early period in the history of the Church.]

[Footnote J: "Dormientis instar," says Bosio, in his _Relatio
Inventionis et Repositionis S. Caeciliae et Sociorum_. The discovery
of the body of the Saint in this perfect state of preservation has,
of course, been attributed by many Romanist authors to miraculous
interposition. But it is to be accounted for by natural causes. The
soil of the catacombs and of Rome is in many parts remarkable for its
antiseptic qualities. The Cavaliere de Rossi informed us that he had
been present at the opening of an ancient tomb on the Appian Way, in
which the body of a young man had been found in a state of entire
preservation, fresh almost as on the day of its burial, and with it was
a piece of sponge which had apparently been soaked in blood,--for his
death had been by violence. In the winter of 1857, two marble sarcophagi
were found in one of the passages of the Catacombs of St. Callixtus, in
which excavations were then going on, and upon being opened, a body
was found in each, in a state, not of entire, but of almost perfect
preservation. The skin had become somewhat shrunk, and the flesh was
hardened and darkened, but the general form and features were preserved.
Possibly these also may have been the bodies of saints. The sarcophagi
were kept through the winter in the catacombs where they were found, and
their marble lids being removed, covers of glass were fitted to them, so
that the bodies might be seen by the visitors to the catacombs. It was a
frequent custom, chiefly in the fourth and fifth centuries, to bury the
rich in sarcophagi placed within tombs in the catacombs.]

The day advanced as these discoveries were made, and Sfondrati having
had a chest of wood hastily lined with silk, and brought to a room in
the adjoining convent, which opened into the church, (it is the room
at the left, now used for the first reception of novices,) carried the
cypress chest with its precious contents to this apartment, and placed
it within the new box, which he locked and sealed. Then, taking the key
with him, he hastened to go out to Frascati, where Pope Clement VIII.
was then staying, to avoid the early autumn airs of Rome. The Pope was
in bed with the gout, and gave audience to no one; but when he heard of
the great news that Sfondrati had brought, he desired at once to see
him, and to hear from him the account of the discovery. "The Pope
groaned and grieved that he was not well enough to hasten at once to
visit and salute so great a martyr." But it happened that the famous
annalist, Cardinal Baronius, was then with the Pope at Frascati, and
Clement ordered him to go to Rome forthwith, in his stead, to behold and
venerate the body of the Saint. Sfondrati immediately took Baronius
in his carriage back to the city, and in the evening they reached the
Church of St. Cecilia.[K] Baronius, in the account which he has left
of these transactions, expresses in simple words his astonishment and
delight at seeing the preservation of the cypress chest, and of the body
of the Saint: "When we at length beheld the sacred body, it was then,
that, according to the words of David, 'as we had heard, so we saw, in
the city of the Lord of Hosts, in the city of our God.'[L] For as we had
read that the venerated body of Cecilia had been found and laid away by
Paschal the Pope, so we found it." He describes at length the posture
of the virgin, who lay like one sleeping, in such modest and noble
attitude, that "whoever beheld her was struck with unspeakable
reverence, as if the heavenly Spouse stood by as a guard watching his
sleeping Bride, warning and threatening: 'Awake not my love till she
please.'"[M] The next morning, Baronius performed Mass in the church in
memory and honor of St. Cecilia, and the other saints buried near her,
and then returned to Frascati to report to the Pope what he had seen. It
was resolved to push forward the works on the church with vigor, and
to replace the body of the Saint under its altar on her feast-day, the
twenty-second of November, with the most solemn pontifical ceremony.

[Footnote K: This account is to be found in the _Annals_ of Baronius,
_ad annum_ 821.]

[Footnote L: Psalm xlviii. 8.]

[Footnote M: Song of Solomon, ii. 7.]

Meanwhile the report of the wonderful discovery spread through Rome,
and caused general excitement and emotion. The Trasteverini, with whom
Cecilia had always been a favorite saint, were filled with joy, with
piety, and superstition. Crowds continually pressed to the church, and
so great was the ardor of worshippers, that the Swiss guards of the
court were needed to preserve order. Lamps were kept constantly burning
around the coffin, which was set near a grating in the wall between the
church and convent, so as to be visible to the devout. "There was
no need of burning perfumes and incense near the sacred body, for a
sweetest odor breathed out from it, like that of roses and lilies."

Sfondrati, desirous to preserve for future generations a memorial
likeness of the Saint, ordered the sculptor Stefano Maderno to make a
statue which should represent the body of Cecilia as it was found lying
in the cypress chest. Maderno was then a youth of twenty-three years.
Sculpture at this time in Rome had fallen into a miserable condition of
degraded conventionalism and extravagance. But Maderno was touched with
the contagion of the religious enthusiasm of the moment, and his work is
full of simple dignity, noble grace, and tender beauty. No other work
of the time is to be compared with it. It is a memorial not only of the
loveliness of the Saint, but of the self-forgetful religious fervor of
the artist, at a period when every divine impulse seemed to be absent
from the common productions of Art. Rome has no other statue of such
sacred charm, none more inspired with Christian feeling. It lies in
front of the high altar, disfigured by a silver crown and a costly
necklace, the offerings of vulgar and pretentious adoration; but even
thus it is at once a proof and prophecy of what Art is to accomplish
under the influence of the Christian spirit. The inscription that
Sfondrati placed before the statue still exists. It is as follows:
"Behold the image of the most holy virgin Cecilia; whom I, Paul,
Cardinal of the Title of St. Cecilia, saw lying perfect in her
sepulchre; which I have caused to be made in this marble, in the very
position of the body, for you."

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