Chapter IX: The Via Appia (2)

_An Olive branch_, as a sign of peace.

_A Palm branch_, as a sign of victory and martyrdom. Rev. vii. 9.

_Allegorical and Biblical Representations._

Of these _The Good Shepherd_ requires an especial notice from the importance which is given to it and its frequent introduction in catacomb art, both in sculpture and painting.

"By far the most interesting of the early Christian paintings is
that of Our Saviour as the Good Shepherd, which is almost
invariably painted on the central space of the dome or cupola,
subjects of minor interest being disposed around it in
compartments, precisely in the style, as regards both the
arrangement and execution, of the heathen catacombs.

"He is represented as a youth in a shepherd's frock and sandals,
carrying the 'lost sheep' on his shoulders, or leaning on his staff
(the symbol, according to St. Augustine, of the Christian
hierarchy), while the sheep feed around, or look up at him.
Sometimes he is represented seated in the midst of the flock,
playing on a shepherd's pipe,--in a few instances, in the oldest
catacombs, he is introduced in the character of Orpheus, surrounded
by wild beasts enrapt by the melody of his lyre,--Orpheus being
then supposed to have been a prophet or precursor of the Messiah.
The background usually exhibits a landscape or meadow, sometimes
planted with olive-trees, doves resting on their branches,
symbolical of the peace of the faithful; in others, as in a fresco
preserved in the Museum Christianum, the palm of victory is
introduced, --but such combinations are endless. In one or two
instances the surrounding compartments are filled with
personifications of the Seasons, apt emblems of human life, whether
natural or spiritual.

"The subject of the Good Shepherd, I am sorry to add, is not of
Roman but Greek origin, and was adapted from a statue of Mercury
carrying a goat, at Tanagra, mentioned by Pausanias. The Christian
composition approximates to its original more nearly in the few
instances where Our Saviour is represented carrying a goat,
emblematical of the scapegoat of the wilderness. Singularly enough,
though of Greek parentage, and recommended to the Byzantines by
Constantine, who erected a statue of the Good Shepherd in the forum
of Constantinople, the subject did not become popular among them;
they seem, at least, to have tacitly abandoned it to Rome."--_Lord
Lindsay's Christian Art._

"The Good Shepherd seems to have been quite the favourite subject.
We cannot go through any part of the Catacombs, or turn over any
collection of ancient Christian monuments, without coming across it
again and again. We know from Tertullian that it was often designed
upon chalices. We find it ourselves painted in fresco upon the
roofs and walls of the sepulchral chambers; rudely scratched upon
gravestones, or more carefully sculptured on sarcophagi; traced in
gold upon glass, moulded on lamps, engraved on rings; and, in a
word, represented on every species of Christian monument that has
come down to us. Of course, amid such a multitude of examples,
there is considerable variety of treatment. We cannot, however,
appreciate the suggestion of Kügler, that this frequent repetition
of the subject is probably to be attributed to the capabilities
which it possessed in an artistic point of view. Rather, it was
selected because it expressed the whole sum and substance of the
Christian dispensation. In the language even of the Old Testament,
the action of Divine Providence upon the world is frequently
expressed by images and allegories borrowed from pastoral life; God
is the Shepherd, and men are His sheep. But in a still more special
way our Divine Redeemer offers Himself to our regards as the Good
Shepherd. He came down from His eternal throne into this wilderness
of the world to seek the lost sheep of the whole human race, and
having brought them together into one fold on earth, thence to
transport them into the ever-verdant pastures of Paradise."--_Roma
Sotterranea._

Other biblical subjects are:--from the _Old Testament_ (those of Noah, Moses, Daniel, and Jonah being the only ones at all common)--

1. The Fall. Adam and Eve on either side of the Tree of Knowledge,
round which the serpent is coiled. Sometimes, instead of this, "Our
Saviour (as the representative of the Deity) stands between them,
condemning them, and offering a lamb to Eve and a sheaf of corn to
Adam, to signify the doom of themselves and their posterity to
delve and to spin through all future ages."

2. The Offering of Cain and Abel. They present a lamb and sheaf of
corn to a seated figure of the Almighty.

3. Noah in the Ark, represented as a box--a dove, bearing an
olive-branch, flies towards him. Interpreted to express the
doctrine that "the faithful having obtained remission of their sins
through baptism, have received from the Holy Spirit the gift of
divine peace, and are saved in the mystical ark of the church from
the destruction which awaits the world."[214] (Acts ii. 47.)

4. Sacrifice of Isaac.

5. Passage of the Red Sea.

6. Moses receiving the Law.

7. Moses striking water from the rock--(very common).

8. Moses pointing to the pots of manna.

9. Elijah going up to heaven in the chariot of fire.

10. The Three Children in the fiery furnace;--very common as
symbolical of martyrdom.

11. Daniel in the lions' den;--generally a naked figure with hands
extended, and a lion on either side; most common--as an
encouragement to Christian sufferers.

12. Jonah swallowed up by the whale, represented as a strange kind
of sea-horse.

13. Jonah disgorged by the whale.

14. Jonah under the gourd; or, according to the Vulgate, under the
ivy.

15. Jonah lamenting for the death of the gourd.

These four subjects from the story of Jonah are constantly
repeated, perhaps as encouragement to the Christians suffering from
the wickedness of Rome--the modern Nineveh, which they were to warn
and pray for.

Subjects from the _New Testament_ are:

1. The Nativity--the ox and the ass kneeling.

2. The Adoration of the Magi--repeatedly placed in juxtaposition
with the story of the Three Children.

3. Our Saviour turning water into wine.

4. Our Saviour conversing with the woman of Samaria.

5. Our Saviour healing the paralytic man--who takes up his bed.
This is very common.

6. Our Saviour healing the woman with the issue of blood.

7. Our Saviour multiplying the loaves and fishes.

8. Our Saviour healing the daughter of the woman of Canaan.

9. Our Saviour healing the blind man.

10. The raising of Lazarus, who appears at a door in his
grave-clothes, while Christ with a wand stands before it. This is
the New Testament subject oftenest introduced. It is constantly
placed in juxtaposition with a picture of Moses striking the rock.
"These two subjects may be intended to represent the beginning and
end of the Christian course, 'the fountain of water springing up to
life everlasting.' God's grace and the gift of faith being typified
by the water flowing from the rock, 'which was Christ,' and life
everlasting by the victory over death and the second life
vouchsafed to Lazarus."[215]

11. Our Saviour's triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

12. Our Saviour giving the keys to Peter--very rare.

13. Our Saviour predicting the denial of Peter.

14. The denial of Peter.

15. Our Saviour before Pilate.

16. St.Peter taken to prison.

These last six subjects are only represented on tombs.[216]

The class of paintings shown as _Liturgical_ are less definite than these. In the Catacombs of Calixtus several obscure paintings are shown (in cubicula anterior to the middle of the third century), which are said to have reference to the sacrament of baptism. Pictures of the paralytic carrying his bed are identified by some Roman Catholic authorities with the sacrament of penance. (!) Bosio believed that in the Catacomb of Sta. Priscilla he had found paintings which illustrated the sacrament of ordination. Representations undoubtedly exist which illustrate the _agape_ or love-feast of the primitive Church.

On the opposite side of the Via Appia from St. Calixtus (generally entered from the road leading to S. Urbano) is the _Catacomb of St. Pretextatus_, interesting as being the known burial-place of several martyrs. A large crypt was discovered here in 1857, built with solid masonry and lined with Greek marble.

"The workmanship points to early date, and specimens of pagan
architecture in the same neighbourhood enable us to fix the middle
of the latter half of the second century (A.D. 175) as a very
probable date for its erection. The Acts of the Saints explain to
us why it was built with bricks, and not hewn out of the rock--viz.
because the Christian who made it (Sta. Marmenia) had caused it to
be excavated immediately below her own house; and now that we see
it, we understand the precise meaning of the words used by the
itineraries describing it--viz. 'a large cavern, most firmly
built.' The vault of the chapel is most elaborately painted, in a
style by no means inferior to the best classical productions of the
age. It is divided into four bands of wreaths, one of roses,
another of corn-sheaves, a third of vine-leaves and grapes (and in
all these, birds are introduced visiting their young in nests), and
the last or highest, of leaves of laurel or the bay-tree. Of course
these severally represent the seasons of spring, summer, autumn,
and winter. The last is a well-known figure or symbol of death; and
probably the laurel, as the token of victory, was intended to
represent the new and Christian idea of the everlasting reward of a
blessed immortality. Below these bands is another border, more
indistinct, in which reapers are gathering in the corn; and at the
back of the arch is a rural scene, of which the central figure is
the Good Shepherd carrying a sheep upon his shoulders. This,
however, has been destroyed by graves pierced through the wall and
the rock behind it, from the eager desire to bury the dead of a
later generation as near as possible to the tombs of the martyrs.
As De Rossi proceeded to examine these graves in detail, he could
hardly believe his eyes when he read around the edge of one of them
these words and fragments of words:--_Mi Refrigeri Januarius
Agatopos Felicissim Martyres_--'Januarius, Agapetus, Felicissimus,
martyrs, refresh the soul of....' The words had been scratched upon
the mortar while it was yet fresh, fifteen centuries ago, as the
prayer of some bereaved relative for the soul of him whom they were
burying here, and now they revealed to the antiquarian of the
nineteenth century the secret he was in quest of--viz. the place of
burial of the saints whose aid is here invoked; for the numerous
examples to be seen in other cemeteries warrant us in concluding
that the bodies of the saints, to whose intercession the soul of
the deceased is here recommended, were at the time of his burial
lying at no great distance."--_Roma Sotterranea._

The St. Januarius buried here was the eldest of the seven sons of St. Felicitas, martyred July 10, A.D. 162. St. Agapitus and St. Felicissimus were deacons of Pope Sixtus II., who were martyred together with him and St. Pretextatus[217] in this very catacomb, because Sixtus II. "had set at nought the commands of the Emperor Valerian."[218]

A mutilated inscription of St. Damasus, in the Catacomb of Calixtus, near the tomb of Cornelius, thus records the death of this pope:

"Tempore quo gladius secuit pia visura Matris
Hic positus rector cælestia jussa docebam;
Adveniunt subito, rapiunt qui forte sedentem;
Militibus missis, populi tunc colla dedere.
Mox sibi cognovit senior quis tollere vellet
Palmam seque suumque caput prior obtulit ipse,
Impatiens feritas posset ne lædere quemquam.
Ostendit Christus reddit qui præmia vitæ
Pastoris meritum, numerum gregis ipse tuetur."

"At the time when the sword pierced the heart of our Mother
(Church), I, its ruler, buried here, was teaching the things of
heaven. Suddenly they came, they seized me seated as I was;--the
soldiers being sent in, the people gave their necks (to the
slaughter). Soon the old man saw who was willing to bear away the
palm from himself, and was the first to offer himself and his own
head, fearing lest the blow should fall on any one else. Christ who
awards the rewards of life recognises the merit of the pastor, he
himself is preserving the number of his flock."

An adjoining crypt, considered to date from A.D. 130, is believed to be the burial-place of St. Quirinus.

Above this catacomb are ruins of two basilicas, erected in honour of St. Zeno; and of Tiburtius, Valerian, and Maximus, companions of Sta. Cecilia in martyrdom.

In the road leading to S. Urbano is the entrance to the _Jewish Catacomb_. It is entered by a chamber open to the sky, floored with black and white mosaic, which is supposed to have formed part of a pagan dwelling. The following chamber has remains of a well. Hence a low door forms the entrance of a gallery out of which open six cubicula, one of them containing a fine while marble sarcophagus, and decorated with a painting of the seven-branched candlestick. A side passage leads to other cubicula, and to an open space which seems to have been an actual arenarium. A winding passage at the end of the larger gallery leads to the graves in the floor divided into different cells for corpses, and called _Cocim_ by Rabbinical writers. A cubiculum at the end of the catacomb has paintings of figures--Plenty, with a cornucopia; Victory, with a palm leaf, &c. The inscriptions found show that this cemetery was exclusively Jewish. They refer to officers of the synagogue, rulers (αρχοντες), and scribes (γραμματεις), &c. The inscriptions are in great part in Greek letters, expressing Latin words.

Another small Jewish catacomb has been discovered behind the basilica of St. Sebastian. Behind the Catacomb of St. Calixtus, on the right of the Via Ardeatina, is the _Catacomb of SS. Nereo ed Achilleo_. Close to its entrance is the farm of _Tor Marancia_, where are some ruins, believed to be remains of the villa of Flavia Domitilla. This celebrated member of the early Christian Church was daughter of the Flavia Domitilla who was sister of the Emperor Domitian,--and wife of Titus Flavius Clemens, son of the Titus Flavius Sabinus who was brother of the Emperor Vespasian. Her two sons were, Vespasian Junior and Domitian Junior, who were intended to succeed to the throne, and to whom Quinctilian was appointed as tutor by the emperor. Dion Cassius narrates that "Domitian put to death several persons, and amongst them Flavius Clemens the consul, although he was his nephew, and although he had Flavia Domitilla for his wife, who was also related to the emperor. They were both accused of atheism, on which charge many others also had been condemned, going after the manners and customs of the Jew; and some of them were put to death, and others had their goods confiscated; but Domitilla was only banished to Pandataria."[219] This Flavia Domitilla is frequently confused with her niece of the same name,[220] whose banishment is mentioned by Eusebius, when he says:--"The teaching of our faith had by this time shone so far and wide, that even pagan historians did not refuse to insert in their narratives some account of the persecution and the martyrdoms that were suffered in it. Some, too, have marked the time accurately, mentioning, amongst many others, in the fifteenth year of Domitian (A.D. 97), Flavia Domitilla, the daughter of a sister of Flavius Clemens, one of the Roman consuls of those days, who, for her testimony for Christ, was punished by exile to the island of Pontia." It was this younger Domitilla who was accompanied in her exile by her two Christian servants, Nereus and Achilles; whose banishment is spoken of by St. Jerome as "a life-long martyrdom,"--whose cell was afterwards visited by Sta. Paula,[221] and who, according to the Acts of SS. Nereus and Achilles, was brought back to the mainland to be burnt alive at Terracina, because she refused to sacrifice to idols. The relics of Domitilla, with those of her servants, were preserved in the catacomb under the villa which had belonged to her Christian aunt.

Receiving as evidence the story of Sta. Domitilla, this catacomb must be looked upon as the oldest Christian cemetery in existence. Its galleries were widened and strengthened by John I. (523--526). A chamber near the entrance is pointed out as the burial-place of Sta. Petronilla.

"The sepulchre of SS. Nereus and Achilles was in all probability in
that chapel to which we descend by so magnificent a staircase, and
which is illuminated by so fine a _luminare_; for that this is the
central point of attraction in the cemetery is clear, both from the
staircase and the luminare just mentioned, as also from the greater
width of the adjacent galleries and other similar tokens." Here
then St. Gregory the Great delivered his twenty-eighth homily
(which Baronius erroneously supposes to have been delivered in the
Church of SS. Nereo ed Achilleo, to which the bodies of the saints
were not yet removed), in which he says--"These saints, before
whose tomb we are assembled, despised the world and trampled it
under their feet, when peace, plenty, riches, and health gave it
charms."

" ... There is a higher and more ancient _piano_, in which coins
and medals of the first two centuries, and inscriptions of great
value, have been recently discovered. Some of these inscriptions
may still be seen in one of the chambers near the bottom of the
staircase; they are both Latin and Greek; sometimes both languages
are mixed; and in one or two instances Latin words are written in
Greek characters. Many of these monuments are of the deepest
importance both in an antiquarian and religious point of view; in
archaeology, as showing the practice of private Christians in the
first ages to make the subterranean chambers at their own expense
and for their own use, _e. g._--'M. Aurelius Restutus made this
subterranean for himself, and those of his family who believed in
the Lord,'--where, both the triple names and the limitation
introduced at the end (which shows that many of his family were
still pagan), are unquestionably proofs of very high
antiquity."--_Northcote's Roman Catacombs_, p. 103, &c.

Among the most remarkable paintings in this catacomb are, Orpheus with his lyre, surrounded by birds and beasts who are charmed with his music; Elijah ascending to heaven in a chariot drawn by four horses; and the portrait of Our Lord.

"The head and bust of our Lord form a medallion, occupying the
centre of the roof in the same _cubiculum_ where Orpheus is
represented. This painting, in consequence of the description
given of it by Kügler (who misnamed the catacomb St. Calixtus), is
often eagerly sought after by strangers visiting the catacombs. It
is only just, however, to add, that they are generally
disappointed. Kügler supposed it to be the oldest portrait of Our
Blessed Saviour in existence, but we doubt if there is sufficient
authority for such a statement. He describes it in these
words:--'The face is oval, with a straight nose, arched eyebrows, a
smooth and rather high forehead, the expression serious and mild;
the hair, parted on the forehead, flows in long curls down the
shoulders; the beard is not thick, but short and divided; the age
between thirty and forty.' But this description is too minute and
precise, too artistic, for the original, as it is now to be seen. A
lively imagination may, perhaps, supply the details described by
our author, but the eye certainly fails to distinguish
them."--_Roma Sotterranea_, p. 253.

Approached by a separate entrance on the slope of the hill-side is a sepulchral chamber, which De Rossi considers to have been the _Burial-place of Sta. Domitilla_.

"It is certainly one of the most ancient and remarkable Christian
monuments yet discovered. Its position, close to the highway; its
front of fine brickwork, with a cornice of terra-cotta, with the
usual space for an inscription (which has now, alas, perished); the
spaciousness of its gallery, with its four or five separate niches
prepared for as many sarcophagi; the fine stucco on the wall; the
eminently classical character of its decorations; all these things
make it perfectly clear that it was the monument of a Christian
family of distinction, excavated at great cost, and without the
slightest attempt at concealment. In passing from the vestibule
into the catacomb, we recognise the transition from the use of the
sarcophagus to that of the common _loculus_; for the first two or
three graves on either side, though really mere shelves in the
wall, are so disguised by painting on the outside as to present to
passers-by the complete outward appearance of a sarcophagus. Some
few of these graves are marked with the names of the dead, written
in black on the largest tiles, and the inscriptions on the other
graves are all of the simplest and oldest form. Lastly, the whole
of the vaulted roof is covered with the most exquisitely graceful
designs, of branches of the vine (with birds and winged genii among
them) trailing with all the freedom of nature over the whole walls,
not fearing any interruption by graves, nor confined by any of
those lines of geometrical symmetry which characterise similar
productions in the next century. Traces also of landscapes may be
seen here and there, which are of rare occurrence in the catacombs,
though they may be seen in the chambers assigned by De Rossi to SS.
Nereus and Achilles. The Good Shepherd, an _agape_, or the heavenly
feast, a man fishing, and Daniel in the lions' den, are the chief
historical or allegorical representations of Christian mysteries
which are painted here. Unfortunately they have been almost
destroyed by persons attempting to detach them from the
wall."--_Roma Sotterranea_, p. 70.

* * * * *

A road to the left now leads to the Via Appia Nuova, passing about a quarter of a mile hence, a turn on the left to the ruin generally known as the _Temple of Bacchus_, from an altar dedicated to Bacchus which was found there, but considered by modern antiquaries as a temple of Ceres and Proserpine. This building has been comparatively saved from the destruction which has befallen its neighbours by having been consecrated as a church in A.D. 820 by Pope Pascal I., in honour of his sainted predecessor Urban I., A.D. 226--whose pontificate was chiefly passed in refuge in the neighbouring Catacomb of St. Calixtus--because of a belief that he was wont to resort hither.

A chapel at a great depth below the church, is shown as that in which St. Urban baptized and celebrated mass. A curious fresco here represents the Virgin between St. Urban and St. John.

Around the upper part of the interior are a much injured series of frescoes, comprising--the life of Christ from the Annunciation to the descent into Hades,--and the life of St. Cecilia and her husband Valerian, ending in the burial of Cecilia by Pope Urban in the Catacombs of Calixtus, and the story of the martyred Urban I. In the picture of the Crucifixion, the thieves have their names, "Calpurnius and Longinus." The frescoes were altered in the seventeenth century to suit the views of the Roman Church, keys being placed in the hand of Peter, &c. Sets of drawings taken _before_ and _after_ the alterations, are preserved in the Barberini Library, and curiously show the difference.

A winding path leads from S. Urbano into the valley. Here, beside the Almo rivulet, is a ruined Nymphæum containing a mutilated statue of a river-god, which was called "the Grotto of Egeria," till a few years ago, when the discovery of the true site of the Porta Capena fixed that of the grotto within the walls. The fine grove of old ilex-trees on the hillside, was at the same time pointed out as the sacred grove of Egeria.

"Egeria! sweet creation of some heart
Which found no mortal resting-place so fair
As thine ideal breast; whate'er thou art
Or wert,--a young Aurora of the air,
The nympholepsy of some fond despair;
Or, it might be, a beauty of the earth,
Who found a more than common votary there
Too much adoring; whatsoe'er thy birth,
Thou wert a beautiful thought, and softly bodied forth.

"The mosses of thy fountain still are sprinkled
With thine Elysian water-drops; the face
Of thy cave-guarded spring, with years unwrinkled,
Reflects the meek-eyed genius of the place,
Whose green, wild margin now no more erase
Art's works; nor must the delicate waters sleep,
Prisoned in marble, bubbling from the base
Of the cleft statue, with a gentle leap
The rill runs o'er, and round, fern, flowers, and ivy, creep,

"Fantastically tangled; the green hills
Are clothed with early blossoms, through the grass
The quick-eyed lizard rustles, and the bills
Of summer-birds sing welcome as ye pass;
Flowers fresh in hue, and many in their class,
Implore the pausing step, and with their dyes
Dance in the soft breeze in a fairy mass;
The sweetness of the violet's deep blue eyes,
Kiss'd by the breath of heaven, seems coloured by its skies."

_Byron, Childe Harold._

It is now known that this nymphæum and the valley in which it stands belonged to the suburban villa called Triopio, of Herodes Atticus, whose romantic story is handed down to us through two Greek inscriptions in the possession of the Borghese family, and is further illustrated by the writings of Filostratus and Pausanias.

A wealthy Greek named Ipparchus offended his government and lost
all his wealth by confiscation, but the family fortunes were
redeemed, through the discovery by his son Atticus of a vast
treasure, concealed in a small piece of ground which remained to
them, close to the rock of the Acropolis. Dreading the avarice of
his fellow-citizens, Atticus sent at once to Nerva, the then
emperor, telling him of the discovery, and requesting his orders as
to what he was to do with the treasure. Nerva replied, that he was
welcome to keep it, and use it as he pleased. Not yet satisfied or
feeling sufficiently sure of the protection of the emperor, Atticus
again applied to him, saying that the treasure was far too vast for
the use of a person in a private station of life, and asking how he
was to use it. The emperor again replied that the treasure was his
own and due to his own good fortune, and that "what he could not
use he might abuse." Atticus then entered securely into possession
of his wealth, which he bequeathed to his son Herodes, who used his
fortune magnificently in his bountiful charities, in the
encouragement of literature and art throughout both Greece and
Italy, and (best appreciated of all by the Greeks) in the splendour
of the public games which he gave.

Early in the reign of Antoninus Pius, Herodes Atticus removed to
Rome, where he was appointed professor of rhetoric to Marcus
Aurelius and Lucius Verus, the two adopted sons of the emperor, and
where he attained the consulship in A.D. 143. Soon after his
arrival he fell in love with Annia Regilla, a beautiful and wealthy
heiress, and in spite of the violent opposition of her brother,
Annius Attilius Braduas, who, belonging to the Julian family, and
claiming an imaginary descent from Venus and Anchises, looked upon
the marriage as a mesalliance, he succeeded in obtaining her hand.
Part of the wealth which Annia Regilla brought to her husband was
the Valle Caffarelli and its nymphæum.

For some years Herodes Atticus and Annia Regilla enjoyed the
perfection of married happiness in this beautiful valley; but
shortly before the expected birth of her fifth child, she died very
suddenly, leaving her husband almost frantic with grief and
refusing every consolation. He was roused, however, from his first
anguish by his brother-in-law Annius Braduas, who had never laid
aside his resentment at the marriage, and who now accused him of
having poisoned his wife. Herodes demanded a public trial, and was
acquitted. Filostratus records that the intense grief he showed and
the depth of the mourning he wore, were taken as signs of his
innocence. Further to clear himself from imputation, Herodes
offered all the jewels of Annia Regilla upon the altar of the
Eleusinian deities, Ceres and Proserpine, at the same time calling
down the vengeance of the outraged gods if he were guilty of
sacrilege.

The beloved Regilla was buried in a tomb surrounded by "a
sepulchral field" within the precincts of the villa, dedicated to
Minerva and Nemesis, and (as recorded in one of the Greek
inscriptions) it was made an act of the highest sacrilege, for any
but her own descendants to be laid within those sacred limits. A
statue was also erected to Regilla in the Triopian temple of Ceres
and Proserpine, which is now supposed to be the same with that
usually called the temple of Bacchus. Not only did Herodes hang his
house with black in his affliction, but all gaily coloured marbles
were stripped from the walls, and replaced with the dark grey
marble known as "bardiglio,"--and his depth of woe made him so
conspicuous, that a satirical person seeing his cook prepare white
beans for dinner, wondered that he could dare to do so in a house
so entirely black.

The inscriptions in which this story is related (one of them containing thirty-nine Greek verses) are engraved on slabs of Pentelic marble--and Philostratus and Pausanias narrate that the quarries of this marble were the property of Herodes, and that in his magnificent buildings he almost exhausted them.[222]

The field path from hence leads back to the Church of Domine Quo Vadis, passing on the right a beautifully-finished tomb (of the time of Septimius Severus) known as the _Temple of Divus Rediculus_, and formerly described as having been built to commemorate the retreat of Hannibal, who came thus far in his intended attack upon Rome. The temple erected in memory of this event was really on the right of the Via Appia. It was dedicated to Rediculus, the god of Return. The folly of ciceroni often cites this name as "Ridiculous."

The neighbourhood of the Divus Rediculus (which he however places
on the _right_ of the Via Appia) is described by Pliny in
connection with a curious story of imperial times. There was a
cobbler who had his stall in the Roman Forum, and who possessed a
tame raven, which was a great favourite with the young Romans, to
whom he would bid good day as he sate perched upon the rostra. At
length he became quite a public character, and the indignation was
so great when his master killed him with his hammer in a fit of
rage at his spoiling some new leather, that they slew the cobbler
and decreed a public funeral to the bird; who was carried to the
grave on a bier adorned with honorary crowns, preceded by a piper,
and supported by two negroes in honour of his colour,--and
buried--"ad rogum usque, qui constructus dextrâ Viæ Appiæ ad
secundum lapidem in campo Rediculo appellate fuit."--_Pliny, Nat.
Hist._ lib. x. c. 60.

* * * * *

Returning to the Via Appia, we reach, on the right, the _Basilica of S. Sebastiano_, rebuilt in 1611 by Flaminio Ponzio for Cardinal Scipio Borghese on the site of a church which had been founded by Constantine, where once existed the house and garden of the matron Lucina, in which she had buried the body of Sebastian, after his (second) martyrdom under Diocletian. The basilica contains nothing ancient, but the six granite columns in the portico. The altar covers the relics of the saint (a Gaul, a native of Narbonne, a Christian soldier under Diocletian) and the chapel of St. Sebastian has a statue of him in his youth, designed by Bernini and executed by Antonio Giorgetti.

"The almost colossal form lies dead, the head resting on his helmet
and armour. It is evidently modelled from nature, and is perhaps
the finest thing ever designed by Bernini.... It is probably from
the association of arrows with his form and story that St.
Sebastian has been regarded from the first ages of Christianity as
the protecting saint against plague and pestilence; Apollo was the
deity who inflicted plague, and therefore was invoked with prayer
and sacrifice against it; and to the honour of Apollo, in this
particular character, St. Sebastian has succeeded."--_Jameson's
Sacred Art_, p. 414.

The original of the footprint in the Domine Quo Vadis is said to be preserved here.

On the left of the entrance is the descent into the catacombs, with the inscription:

"In hoc sacrosancto loco qui dicitur ad Catacumbas, ubi sepulta
fuerunt sanctorum martyrum corpora 174,000 ac 46 summorum
pontificium pariterque martyrum. In altare in quo corpus divi
Sebastiani Christi athletæ jacet celebrans summus Pontifex S.
Gregorius Magnus vidit angelum Dei candidiorem nive, sibi in
tremendo sacrificio ministrantem ac dicentem, 'Hic est locus
sacratissimus in quo est divina promissio et omnium peccatorum
remissio, splendor et lux perpetua, sine fine lætitia, quam Christi
martyr Sebastianus habere promeruit.' Prout Severanus Tom. Pº.
pagina 450, ac etiam antiquissimæ lapideæ testantur tabulæ.

"Ideo in hoc insigne privilegiato altari, tam missæ cantatæ quam
privatæ, dum celebrante, animæ quæ sunt in purgatorio pro quibus
sacrificium offertur plenariam indulgentiam, et omnium suorum
peccatorum remissionem consequuntur prout ab angelo dictum fuit et
summi pontifices confirmarunt."

These are the catacombs which are most frequently visited by strangers, because they can always be seen on application to the monks attached to the church,--though they are of greatly inferior interest to those of St Calixtus.

"Though future excavations may bring to light much that is
interesting in this cemetery, the small portion now accessible is,
as a specimen of the Catacombs, utterly without value. Its only
interest consists in its religious associations: here St. Bridget
was wont to kneel, rapt in contemplation; here St. Charles Borromeo
spent whole nights in prayer; and here the heart of St. Philip Neri
was so inflamed with divine love as to cause his very bodily frame
to be changed."--_Northcote's Roman Catacombs._

"Philip, on thee the glowing ray
Of heaven came down upon thy prayer,
To melt thy heart, and burn away
All that of earthly dross was there.

"And so, on Philip when we gaze,
We see the image of his Lord;
The saint dissolves amid the blaze
Which circles round the Living Word.

"The meek, the wise, none else is here,
Dispensing light to men below;
His awful accents fill the ear,
Now keen as fire, now soft as snow."

_J. H. Newman_, 1850.

Owing to the desire in the early Christian Church of saving the graves of their first confessors and martyrs from desecration, almost all the catacombs were gradually blocked up, and by lapse of time their very entrances were forgotten. In the fourteenth century very few were still open. In the fifteenth century none remained except this of St. Sebastian, which continued to be frequented by pilgrims, and was called in all ancient documents "cœmeterium ad catacumbas."

At the back of the high-altar is an interesting half-subterranean building, attributed to Pope Liberius (352--355), and afterwards adorned by Pope Damasus, who briefly tells its history in one of his inscriptions, which may still be seen here:

"Hinc habitasse prius sanctos cognoscere debes,
Nomina quisque Petri pariter Paulique requiris.
Discipulos Oriens misit, quod sponte fatemur,
Sanguinis ob meritum Christumque per astra sequuti,
Aetherios petiere sinus et regna piorum.
Roma suos potius meruit defendere cives.
Hæc Damasus vestras referat sidera laudes."

"Here you should know that saints dwelt. Their names, if you ask
them, were Peter and Paul. The East sent disciples, which we freely
acknowledge. For the merit of their blood they followed Christ to
the stars, and sought the heavenly home and the kingdom of the
blest. Rome however deserved to defend her own citizens. May
Damasus record these things for your praise, O new stars."

"The two Apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul, were originally buried,
the one at the Vatican, the other on the Ostian Way, at the spot
where their respective basilicas now stand; but, as soon as the
Oriental Christians had heard of their death, they sent some of
their brethren to remove their bodies, and bring them back to the
East, where they considered that they had a right to claim them as
their fellow-citizens and countrymen. These so far prospered in
their mission as to gain a momentary possession of the sacred
relics, which they carried off, along the Appian Way, as far as the
spot where the church of St. Sebastian was afterwards built. Here
they rested for a while, to make all things ready for their
journey, or, according to another account, were detained by a
thunderstorm of extraordinary violence, which delay, however
occasioned, was sufficient to enable the Christians of Rome to
overtake them and recover their lost treasure. These Roman
Christians then buried the bodies, with the utmost secrecy, in a
deep pit, which they dug on the very spot where they were. Soon,
indeed, they were restored to their original places of sepulture,
as we know from contemporary authorities, and there seems reason to
believe the old ecclesiastical tradition to be correct, which
states them to have only remained in this temporary abode for a
year and seven months. The body of St. Peter, however, was destined
to revisit it a second time, and for a longer period; for when, at
the beginning of the third century, Heliogabalus made his circus at
the Vatican, Calixtus, who was then pope, removed the relics of the
Apostle to their former temporary resting-place, the pit on the
Appian Way. But in A.D. 257, St. Stephen, the pope, having been
discovered in this very cemetery and having suffered martyrdom
there, the body of St. Peter was once more removed, and restored to
its original tomb in the Vatican."--_Northcote's Roman Catacombs._

In the passages of this catacomb are misguiding inscriptions placed here in 1409 by William, Archbishop of Bourges, calling upon the faithful to venerate _here_ the tombs of Sta. Cecilia and of many of the martyred popes, who are buried elsewhere. The martyr St. Cyrinus is known to have been buried here from very early itineraries, but his grave has not been discovered.

"When I was a boy, being educated at Rome, I used every Sunday, in
company with other boys of my own age and tastes, to visit the
tombs of the apostles and martyrs, and to go into the crypts
excavated there in the bowels of the earth. The walls on either
side as you enter are full of the bodies of the dead, and the whole
place is so dark, that one seems almost to see the fulfilment of
those words of the prophet, 'Let them go down alive into Hades.'
Here and there a little light, admitted from above, suffices to
give a momentary relief to the horror of the darkness; but as you
go forwards, and find yourself again immersed in the utter
blackness of night, the words of the poet come spontaneously to
your mind: 'The very silence fills the soul with dread.'"--_St.
Jerome_ (A.D. 354), _In Ezek._ ch. lx.

"A gaunt Franciscan friar, with a wild bright eye, was our only
guide down into this profound and dreadful place. The narrow ways
and openings hither and thither, coupled with the dead and heavy
air, soon blotted out, in all of us, any recollection of the track
by which we had come; and I could not help thinking, 'Good Heaven,
if in a sudden fit of madness he should dash the torches out, or if
he should be seized with a fit, what would become of us!' On we
wandered, among martyrs' graves: passing great subterranean vaulted
roads, diverging in all directions, and choked up with heaps of
stones, that thieves and murderers may not take refuge there, and
form a population under Rome, even worse than that which lives
between it and the sun. Graves, graves, graves; graves of men, of
women, of little children, who ran crying to the persecutors, 'We
are Christians! we are Christians!' that they might be murdered
with their parents; graves with the palm of martyrdom roughly cut
into their stone boundaries, and little niches, made to hold a
vessel of the martyr's blood; graves of some who lived down here,
for years together, ministering to the rest, and preaching truth,
and hope, and comfort, from the rude altars, that bear witness to
their fortitude at this hour; more roomy graves, but far more
terrible, where hundreds, being surprised, were hemmed in and
walled up; buried before death, and killed by slow starvation.

"'The triumphs of the Faith are not above-ground in our splendid
churches,' said the friar, looking round upon us, as we stopped to
rest in one of the low passages, with bones and dust surrounding us
on every side. 'They are here! among the martyrs' graves!' He was a
gentle, earnest man, and said it from his heart; but when I thought
how Christian men have dealt with one another; how, perverting our
most merciful religion, they have hunted down and tortured, burnt
and beheaded, strangled, slaughtered, and oppressed each other; I
pictured to myself an agony surpassing any that this Dust had
suffered with the breath of life yet lingering in it, and how these
great and constant hearts would have been shaken--how they would
have quailed and drooped--if a foreknowledge of the deeds that
professing Christians would commit in the great name for which they
died, could have rent them with its own unutterable anguish, on the
cruel wheel, and bitter cross, and in the fearful
fire."--_Dickens._

"Countless martyrs, they say, rest in these ancient sepulchres. In
these dark depths the ancient Church took refuge from persecution;
there she laid her martyrs, and there, over their tombs, she
chaunted hymns of triumph, and held communion with Him for whom
they died. In that church I spend hours. I have no wish to descend
into those sacred sepulchres, and pry among the graves the
resurrection trump will open soon enough. I like to think of the
holy dead, lying undisturbed and quiet there; of their spirits in
Paradise; of their faith triumphant in the city that massacred
them.

"No doubt they also had their perplexities, and wondered why the
wicked triumph, and sighed to God, 'How long, O Lord, how
long?'"--_Schonberg Cotta Family._

"And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the
souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the
testimony which they held: and they cried with a loud voice,
saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and
avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? And white robes
were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that
they should rest yet for a little season, until their
fellow-servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as
they were, should be fulfilled."--_Rev._ vi. 9--11.

In the valley beneath S. Sebastiano are the ruins of the _Circus of Maxentius_, near those of a villa of that emperor. The circus was 1482 feet long, 244 feet broad, and was capable of containing 15,000 spectators, yet it is a miniature compared with the Circus Maximus, though very interesting as retaining in tolerable preservation all the different parts which composed a circus. The circular ruin near it was a _Temple_ dedicated by Maxentius to his son Romulus.

"Le jeune Romulus, étant mort, fut placé au rang des dieux, dans
cet olympe qui s'écroulait. Son père lui éleva un temple dont la
partie inférieure se voit encore, et le cirque lui-même fut
peut-être une dépendance de ce temple funèbre, car les courses de
chars étaient un des honneurs que l'antiquité rendait aux morts, et
sont souvent pour cela représentées sur les tombeaux."--_Ampère,
Emp._ ii. 360.

These ruins are very picturesque, backed by the peaks of the Sabine range, which in winter are generally covered with snow.

The opposite hill is crowned by the _Tomb of Cecilia Metella_, daughter of Quintus Metellus Creticus, and wife of Crassus. It is a round tower, seventy feet in diameter. The bulls' heads on the frieze gave it the popular name of Capo di Bove. The marble coating of the basement was carried off by Urban VIII. to make the fountain of Trevi. The battlements were added when the tomb was turned into a fortress by the Caëtani in the thirteenth century.

"About two miles, or more, from the city gates, and right upon the
roadside, is an immense round pile, sepulchral in its original
purpose, like those already mentioned. It is built of great blocks
of hewn stone, on a vast, square foundation of rough, agglomerated
material, such as composes the mass of all the other ruinous tombs.
But, whatever might be the cause, it is in a far better state of
preservation than they. On its broad summit rise the battlements of
a mediæval fortress, out of the midst of which (so long since had
time begun to crumble the supplemental structure, and cover it with
soil, by means of wayside dust) grow trees, bushes, and thick
festoons of ivy. This tomb of a woman has become the dungeon-keep
of a castle; and all the care that Cecilia Metella's husband could
bestow, to secure endless peace for her beloved relics, only
sufficed to make that handful of precious ashes the nucleus of
battles, long ages after her death."--_Hawthorne, Transformation._

"There is a stern round tower of other days,
Firm as a fortress, with its fence of stone,
Such as an army's baffled strength delays,
Standing with half its battlements alone,
And with two thousand years of ivy grown,
The garland of eternity, where wave
The green leaves over all by time o'erthrown;--
What was this tower of strength? within its cave
What treasure lay so lock'd, so hid?--a woman's grave.

"But who was she, the lady of the dead,
Tomb'd in a palace? Was she chaste and fair?
Worthy a king's--or more--a Roman's bed?
What race of chiefs and heroes did she bear?
What daughter of her beauties was the heir?
How lived--how loved--how died she? Was she not
So honoured--and conspicuously there,
Where meaner relics must not dare to rot,
Placed to commemorate a more than mortal lot?

"Perchance she died in youth: it may be, bow'd
With woes far heavier than the ponderous tomb
That weigh'd upon her gentle dust, a cloud
Might gather o'er her beauty, and a gloom
In her dark eye, prophetic of the doom
Heaven gives its favourites--early death; yet shed
A sunset charm around her, and illume
With hectic light, the Hesperus of the dead,
Of her consuming cheek the autumnal leaf-like red.

"Perchance she died in age--surviving all,
Charms, kindred, children--with the silver grey
On her long tresses, which might yet recall,
It may be, still a something of the day
When they were braided, and her proud array
And lovely form were envied, praised, and eyed
By Rome--but whither would Conjecture stray?
Thus much alone we know--Metella died,
The wealthiest Roman's wife: Behold his love or pride!"

_Childe Harold._

Close to the tomb are the ruins of a Gothic church of the Caëtani.

"Le tombeau de Cecilia-Metella était devenu un château fort alors
aux mains des Caëtani, et autour du château s'était formé un
village avec son église, dont on a récemment retrouvé les
restes."--_Ampère, Voyage Dantesque._

It is at Cecilia Metella's tomb that the beauties of the Via Appia really begin. A very short distance further, we emerge from the walls which have hitherto shut in the road on either side, and enjoy uninterrupted views over the Latin plain, strewn with its ruined castles and villages--and the long lines of aqueducts, to the Sabine and Alban mountains.

"The Via Appia is a magnificent promenade, amongst ruinous tombs,
the massive remains of which extend for many miles over the Roman
Campagna. The powerful families of ancient Rome loved to build
monuments to their dead by the side of the public road, probably to
exhibit at once their affection for their relations and their own
power and affluence. Most of these monuments are now nothing but
heaps of ruins, upon which are placed the statues and sculptures
which have been found in the earth or amongst the rubbish. Those
inscriptions which have been found on the Via Appia bear witness to
the grief of the living for the dead, but never to the hope of
reunion. On a great number of sarcophagi or the friezes of tombs
may be seen the dead sitting or lying as if they were alive, some
seem to be praying. Many heads have great individuality of
character. Sometimes a white marble figure, beautifully draped,
projects from these heaps of ruins, but without head or hands;
sometimes a hand is stretched out, or a portion of a figure rises
from the tomb. It is a street through monuments of the dead, across
an immense churchyard; for the desolate Roman Campagna may be
regarded as such. To the left it is scattered with the ruins of
colossal aqueducts, which, during the time of the emperors,
conveyed lakes and rivers to Rome, and which still, ruinous and
destroyed, delight the eye by the beautiful proportions of their
arcades. To the right is an immense prairie, without any other
limit than that of the ocean, which, however, is not seen from it.
The country is desolate, and only here and there are there any huts
or trees to be seen."--_Frederika Bremer._

"For the space of a mile or two beyond the gate of S. Sebastiano,
this ancient and famous road is as desolate and disagreeable as
most of the other Roman avenues. It extends over small,
uncomfortable paving-stones, between brick and plastered walls,
which are very solidly constructed, and so high as almost to
exclude a view of the surrounding country. The houses are of the
most uninviting aspect, neither picturesque, nor homelike and
social; they have seldom or never a door opening on the wayside,
but are accessible only from the rear, and frown inhospitably upon
the traveller through iron-grated windows. Here and there appears a
dreary inn, or a wine-shop, designated by the withered bush beside
the entrance, within which you discover a stone-built and
sepulchral interior, where guests refresh themselves with sour
bread and goat's-milk cheese, washed down with wine of dolorous
acerbity.

"At frequent intervals along the roadside, up rises the ruin of an
ancient tomb. As they stand now, these structures are immensely
high, and broken mounds of conglomerated brick, stone, pebbles, and
earth, all molten by time into a mass as solid and indestructible
as if each tomb were composed of a single boulder of granite. When
first erected, they were cased externally, no doubt, with slabs of
polished marble, artfully wrought, bas-reliefs, and all such
suitable adornments, and were rendered majestically beautiful by
grand architectural designs. This antique splendour has long since
been stolen from the dead, to decorate the palaces and churches of
the living. Nothing remains to the dishonoured sepulchres, except
their massiveness.

"Even the pyramids form hardly a stranger spectacle, or a more
alien from human sympathies, than the tombs of the Appian Way, with
their gigantic height, breadth, and solidity, defying time and the
elements, and far too mighty to be demolished by an ordinary
earthquake. Here you may see a modern dwelling, and a garden with
its vines and olive-trees, perched on the lofty dilapidation of a
tomb, which forms a precipice of fifty feet in depth on each of the
four sides. There is a house on that funeral mound, where
generations of children have been born, and successive lives have
been spent, undisturbed by the ghost of the stern Roman whose ashes
were so preposterously burdened. Other sepulchres wear a crown of
grass, shrubbery, and forest-trees, which throw out a broad sweep
of branches, having had time, twice over, to be a thousand years
of age. On one of them stands a tower, which, though immemorially
more modern than the tomb, was itself built by immemorial hands,
and is now rifted quite from top to bottom by a vast fissure of
decay; the tomb-hillock, its foundation, being still as firm as
ever, and likely to endure until the last trump shall rend it wide
asunder, and summon forth its unknown dead.

"Yes, its unknown dead! For, except in one or two doubtful
instances, these mountainous sepulchral edifices have not availed
to keep so much as the bare name of an individual or a family from
oblivion. Ambitious of everlasting remembrance as they were, the
slumberers might just as well have gone quietly to rest, each in
his pigeon-hole of a columbarium, or under his little green
hillock, in a grave-yard, without a headstone to mark the spot. It
is rather satisfactory than otherwise, to think that all these idle
pains have turned out so utterly abortive."--_Hawthorne._

Near the fourth milestone, is the tomb of Marcus Servilius Quartus (with an inscription), restored by Canova in 1808. A bas-relief of the death of Atys, killed by Adrastus, a short distance beyond this, has been suggested as part of the tomb of Seneca, who was put to death "near the fourth milestone" by order of Nero. An inscribed tomb beyond this is that of Sextus Pompeius Justus.

Near this, in the Campagna on the left, are some small remains, supposed to be those of a Temple of Juno.