CkUcombe. Fig. 1.
found. The number of graves in each tier depends on the height of the wall ; there are commonly three to five ; but even twelve are found'in one instance. The tomb is closed up-, either with a slab of marble (as in ¥\g, 8) or with large bricks ^s in Fig. 2). Inscriptions and em- blems are found' sculp- tured or pafaited on Uaiacombe. iMg. 2. many of the slabs (see Fig. 8), and in some cases a
CATACOMBS
146
CATACOMBS
smill vase (Fig. 2), supposed to have held blood, is found attached to the end of the tomb.
Catacombe. Fig. 8.
Besides the loculi in the corridors and passages, there are also larger spaces (called orcoto^), haying aa arch over the tomb, or over a sarcophagus, hollowed out of the wall. There are also larger sepulchral chambers, called cttbiculay of various shapes — square, triangular, semicircular, etc. These were doubtless family vaults ; their walls are full of separate locuU, On the arch in front was a family inscription ; e. g. on one found in the Catacombs of St. Agnes is the title Cvbiadum Dcmi- (iani; while the separate loculi within had their indi- vidual inscriptions.
2. At Placet o/Wonhip in Timet of PerteaUicn cmd Trf vble. — Chambers are found adapted to this purpose, some capable of holding a small assembly of worship- pers, and others having room for but a few, who prob- ably went there to commemorate the dead buried in the crypts. In some cases there is an opening from these crypts to the upper air sufficient to let in light, but commonly they were illuminated by lamps suspended by bronze chainJs from the roof. Cisterns and wells are sometimes found in them which served for use in baptisms. "The superstitious reverence which in later times was paid to the relics of martyrs was per- haps owing, in some measure, to the living and tlie dead being brought into so close contact in the early ages, and to the necessity of the same place being used at once for the offices of devotion and for burial'* (Bur- ton, Ecclet. Hittory^ p. 841). In later times churches were built over the entrances to the chief catacombs ; e. g. St Peter's, over those of the Vatican ; St. Paul's, over those of St. Lucina ; St. Agnes, over the cata- combs which bear her nariie, and in which, according to tradition, she was buried.
8. At Placet of Refuge, — It is among the Roman traditions that Pope Stephen long dwelt in the Cata- comb?, held synods there, and was finally killed in his episcopal chair. Even after the establishment of the Church under Constantine, the Catacombs served for places of refiige for various popes in times of trouble. Liberius, it is said, lived a year in the cemetery of St. Agnes ; and in the beginning of the fifth century, dur- ing one of the many disputes for the papal chair, Boni- face concealed himself in one of the catacombs. There is little doubt that large numbers of Christians toolc refUge in the Catacombs during the early persecutions. A Protestant writer remarks that in the preparation of these vast caverns we may trace the presiding care of Providence. **As America, discovered a few years before the Reformation, furnished a hiding-place of ref- uge to the Protestants who fled f^om ecclesiastical in- tolerance, so the catacombs, reopened shortly before the birth of our Lord, supplied shelter to the Christians in Rome during the flneqncnt proscriptions of the sec- ond and third centuries. When the Gospel was first propagated in the imperial city its adherents belonged chiefiy to the lower classes ; and, for reasons of which it is now impossible to speak with certaint}% it seems to have been soon very generally embraced by the quarrymen and sand-diggers. It is probable that many were condemned to labor in those mines as a punish- ment for having embraced Christianity (see Lee's Three Lecturet, Dublin, p. 28 ; Maitland's Ckvrch in the Cata- eombt, p. 24. Dr. Maitland visited Rome in 1841, but hiB inspection of the Lapidarian Gallery seems to have
been regarded with extreme jealousy by the authoii- ties there). Thus it was when persecation raged in the capital ; the Christian felt himself comparatively safe in the catacombs. The parties in charge of them were his friends ; they could give him seasonable intimation of the approach of danger, and among theee * dens and caves of the earth,' witib countless places of ingress and egress, the officers of government most have attempted in vain to overtake a fugitive" (Killen, 7%e Andmt OvrcA, p. 860). •
IV. Number cmd Extent of the Catacombt,— The ac- tual number of catacombs has never been accnrataely known. Aringhi, followed by other writers, gave the number as high as sixty, but without proof. De Roe- si's list gives forty-two, only twenty-six of which are extensive, while five date after the peace secured for the Church under Constantine, mostly within a circle of three miles fh)m the modem walls ; the most r^ mote being that of St. Alexander, about six miles on the Via Nomentara. It was formerly held that the catacombs around Rome were connected together in a vast system, but De Rossi has shown that there is no such connection. The most remarkable catacombs are on the left bank of the Tiber ; viz. the catacombs of Sts. Julius, Valentinus, BasUla, Gianutus, Priscilla, Brigi- da, Agnes, Hippolytus, Peter, and Marcellinns, etc On the Via Appia are the extensive catacombs of Pre- textatus, Callistus (not far fh>m the latter is an inter- esting Jewish catacomb, discovered in 1859), Sts. Ne- reus and Achilleus, and others. On the rig/it bank there are few catacombs of interest except those of the Vatican. Tradition fixes upon this as tiie spot where St Peter was buried ; and in the belief of this trmdi- tion the ''church of St. Peter was built on the neigh- boring hill. The modem cemetery of the Vatican is over the more ancient one, contraiy to the general rule. The number of bodies deposited in the cata- comljs cannot, of course, be accurately ascertained. P. Marchi estimates it at six millions. Michele di Rossi calculates, from carefully-gathered data, that the total length of all the galleries known to exist near Rome is 957,800 yards, equal to about 590 miles, but only a small part of this vast range has been explored.