The recently excavated house of Pudens on the Viminal Hill is thus connected with that just described. Pudens, mentioned in 2 Ti 4^', in company with Linus and Claudia (see Pudens), has been the subject of many conjectures (see Lightfoot, Clement, i. 76ff., ii. 464; Farrar, St. Paul, p. 681), upon which Roman archfEology has thrown no light. The church, now called S. Pudentiana (a later ignorant change from the earlier name 'the church of Pudens' — Ecchsia Pudentiana), has existed in some form on the present site from very early times. Pius I. in tlie middle of the 2nd cent, granted to Pudentiana, Praxedes, and Timotheus, daughters and son of Pudens, th: institution of a regnhar titulus, or parish, with a font for baptism. Here, too, were preserved some pieces of household furniture used by St. Peter during his stay. Part of this, the old wooden table on which the apostle is said to have celebrated the Lord's Supper, was given by Cardinal Wiseman (who was titular of the church)
to St. .John Lateran. If it had been a stone altar or an elaborate piece of work, doubt would easily gather round it. But there is nothing per s» against the genuineness of the relic. The excava- tion of the house is still proceeding.
Together with the house of Prisca and the house of Pudens, both genuine memorials of the apostolic age and closely connected with St. Peter and St. Paul, should be mentioned the house of Clement beneath the lower church of S. Clemente near the Colosseum (see Lightfoot, Clement, i. 91 li'.). This has been for many years Hooded with water ; but one of the present writers was privileged, by the kind permission of the authorities, to inspect it so far as possible this year (1900), and it is to be hoped that ere long it may be drained and once more opened to the archaeologist and the pilgrim. For its interest is that of the apostolic times, whatever view wo may take of the personality of St. Clement and of his connexion with the Clement mentioned by St. Paul.
There remain to be noticed only the catacombs and other funereal memorials of Rome bearing on NT times. The inscriptions, frescoes, and monu- ments have been mostly removed to the Lateran and Capitoline museums, and can be there studied with the help of such works as de Rossi, Northcote (though now somewhat out of date), Witherow, The Catacombs of Rome, and Malleson and Tuke's Handbook to Christian and Ecclesiastical Rome, 3 vols, (the catacombs are dealt with in the first volume). The exploration of the columbarium of the empress Livia has led to the possible identifica- tion of some of the names in Ro 16 (.see Light- foot, Philippians, Excursus). See also Nereus.
Monumental evidence also confirms the tradi- tional friendship between Seneca and St. Paul. See L.anciani, Pagan and Christian Rome; Ranisaj', St. Paul the Traveller, p. 353 if.
Much still has to be done before our knowledge of Rome in the 1st cent, is anything like complete, and almost every day brings its news. The enthu- siastic band of Italian scholars, headed by Lanciani and Marucchi and Baccelli, is working hard, and great tilings are expected from the newly founded British School in Rome. The Bullcttino and the Nuovo Bullettino contain full records of all recent discoveries. Among the researches needing to be made are those concerning the burial of other apostles in Rome, in addition to those already named, e.g. St. Timothy (in St. Paul's outside the walls), St. Bartholomew, etc., and a scientific sifting of the evidence concerning many of the Eastern relics (such as the Santa Scala) and remains. In the case of the latter class the his- tory is fairlj' clear from the time of Helena onwards, but before that, which is the crucial period, it is all vague and unsatisfactory.
Professor James Orr, in his Neglected Factors in the Study of the Early Progress of Chrittianity (1899), has suggested two fields of inquiry — first, into the actual numbers of Christians in the city in the 1st cent, (on this the evidence of the cata- combs has yet to be examined fully, but the numbers apjiear to have been very much larger than is commonly supposed) ; and, secondly, into the social status of those who were drawn into the infant Church. He has shoAvn very clearly that the poor were by no means the only members, and the evidence of houses like those of Pudens, Prisca, and Clement, of churches like that discovered this year (1900) on the very Palatine Hill itself (of as yet unknown date, but very early), all goes to show that then as now the gospel was universal in its power as well as in its claim, and that St. Paul's great Apologia in Rom.aiis for the 'wisdom ' of God was addressed to the wise and leani»i an well as to the freedmen and slaves.
ROOF
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311
LlTERATt'RB. — See, besidea the works already mentioned, Bchiirer, Die Gein*xndev«r/as8utuj dtr Jridrjt in Kom, 1879, UJF I. i. 231, I!, ii. 232 et ptuxim ; Berliner, fjesch. d. J\id. in Horn, Io93 ; Hollzmann, Aiusicdciuiuj d*.'^ chrUtcnihuitu in Rom, lb74 ; Schmidt, Ajijunge des ChriaUnthuinv in dtT Stadt Rcnn, lb79 ; Friedliinder, Sitienrieschichte lioms, i. 1-183, iii. 506, etc.ClSolO; Kenan, Uibbert Lecture, 18iis;Ilild. 'LesJuifs Jl Kom,' In Jtev. d. ilt.JuiviS, 18^, etc. ; Uuidekoper, JU4fauf7n at Hume, 1876; the articles in Kiehui's UWD, Schenkel'a liHid.-Lez., Hamburger's /iA'. ;Lanciaiii, liuini and Excavations of Ancient Home; banday-Hea^llam, Koinans (Internat. Grit. Com.); de Bussierre, Let Sepl Basitiqueg de Rome ; Mrs, Jameson, Hacrt:d and Le'jendary Art, vol. L ; Stanley's Sennona and Knnaijs on the Apontolic Age ; Murray's llandt*ook for Home, ed. I'ullen, Murray, Layard, and Lanciani ; iiiacdutf, FoottitepK nf ,St. Paul; I'lumptre, Excursus on the later years of St. I'aul's life, in Com- menlarij on Acta (^^T Com. for Knglish Readers); Gloag, Catholic EpijitUif, pp. 140-100 ; MuUooly, S. Clemente ; itamsay, * Paul the StAtefimao,' in Conteinp. Rev., JIarch 1901.