On iii 3 Scotus calls attention to the difference of 'denuo et avlev hoc est desursum'; on iii 13 he says that 'ascendit' might be present or perfect, 'sed in Graeco non est ambiguum.' On iii 27: nisi fuerit ei datum de caelo. In quibusdam codicibus Graecorum legitur nisi fuerit ei datum desursum de caelo. For this volev Tischendorf quotes only 13, 69, 129; Wettstein adds the Armenian version. Codex 69 is the famous codex of Leicester, of the origin of which Dr Rendel Harris treated in 1887. here a trace of one of its ancestors? Have we EB. NESTLE. RECENT DISCOVERIES IN THE CATACOMB OF S. CALLISTUS. THAT the opening number of the new Journal of Roman Studies should contain an article on the topic about to be discussed is of good omen for the study of Christian archaeology in England. Our country sends forth few workers in this field, which might well occupy the attention of some of those attracted to Rome by the advantages for study offered by the British School of Archaeology. The last decade has been fruitful of discovery in the catacombs. Readers of the Journal of Theological Studies will recollect that excavations in the Catacomb of Priscilla on the Via Salaria have made it possible to determine with some approach to certainty the spot hallowed by tradition as the scene of S. Peter's ministry. The works upon which Miss Barker's article in the Journal of Roman Studies are based deal with the group of cemeteries lying on or between the Via Appia and Via Ardeatina, and although they do not carry us back to Apostolic times, they throw much fresh light on the history of the third century and its martyrs. Unfortunately, the interpretation of the remains which have been discovered has led to much diversity of opinion and to a bitter and unedifying controversy between the principal writers on the subject, of which as little as possible will here be said. The queen of roads' and the relatively unimportant highway which led from Rome to Ardea issued from the city by the Porta Capena and Porta Naevia respectively, and when the walls of Aurelian were built, the first passed through the new Porta Appia, whilst a small gateway, the Porta Ardeatina, which was blocked in the middle ages and finally destroyed by Sangallo to make room for his bastion, gave passage to the second. The Via Ardeatina, however, fell into disuse in the Dark Ages, and the name is now commonly applied to the branch-road which leaves the Via Appia close to the chapel of Domine quo vadis? and joins the original line of the Via Ardeatina in the neighbourhood of the estate of Tor Marancia, famous both for the discoveries of classical sculpture made in 1827, and also as the site of the Catacomb of Domitilla, the nucleus of which was formed by the burial-place of those members of the Flavian house who embraced Christianity. In the triangle formed by the Via Appia, the Via Ardeatina (in the modern sense) and the cross-road known as the Via delle Sette Chiese, is a large group of cemeteries to which the name of S. Callistus is popularly attached. These cemeteries were the scene of the great De Rossi's most famous discoveries, and the three volumes of his Roma sotterranea are almost entirely concerned with this region. The continuation of this great work-the publication of which was suspended on the death of De Rossi-has been entrusted to Orazio Marucchi, the indefatigable secretary of the Commissione di Archeologia sacra, and a fourth volume, containing the first instalment of a description of the Catacomb of Domitilla, was issued in 1909. But the excavations carried on in 1902-3 and again since 1908 in the so-called Catacomb of S. Callistus have made clear some points which De Rossi was forced to leave in obscurity, and have at the same time raised fresh problems, the solution of which cannot yet be said to have been achieved. Mgr Wilpert, whose work on the paintings of the catacombs is a classic, has summed up the results of the new discoveries in what he announces as the first of a series of essays supplementary to Roma sotterranea1; but his conclusions differ widely from those of Marucchi, who devotes some sections of his own volume to the controversy, which has been in progress for some years past. The region, in fact, in which the monuments in dispute lie, though not directly adjacent to the Catacomb of Domitilla, is also bordered by the Via Ardeatina, and the itineraries of the Middle Ages, upon the interpretation of which much depends, treat the cemeteries of the Via Appia and Via Ardeatina in close connexion. The Catacomb of S. Callistus takes its name from the deacon who, as we are told by the author of the Piloσopoúμeva, was entrusted by S. Zephyrinus (199-217) with the administration of the cemetery', and succeeded his patron as Pope (217-222). Neither of these Popes was, however, buried in the 'cemetery of Callistus' properly so-called. Callistus himself, according to the Liber pontificalis, found his last resting-place in the coemeterium Calepodii on the Via Aurelia, while 1 Die Papstgräber und die Cäciliengruft, 1909 (Ital. trans. La cripta dei Papi, &c., 1910). 2 ix 12 (εἰς τὸ κοιμητήριον κατέστησεν). 3 The predecessors of S. Zephyrinus were all buried beside S. Peter in the Vatican. Zephyrinus (again according to the Lib. pont.) was buried in cymiterio suo iuxta cymiterium Calisti via Appia. S. Urban, too (222-230), is stated by the best authorities to have been buried in the cemetery of Praetextatus, which lies to the east of the Via Appia. Of the ten Popes who succeeded him, however, all save one-S. Cornelius, whose burial-place in the crypta Lucinae on the Via Appia was discovered by De Rossi in 1849-are said to have been buried in cymiterio Calisti; and nearly all, as we shall see, were doubtless laid to rest in the famous Papal crypt which adjoins that of S. Cecilia. The next two Popes, S. Marcellinus (296-308) and S. Marcellus (308-9), were buried in the Catacomb of Priscilla; S. Eusebius, however (309-311), and S. Miltiades (311-314) had their tombs in the cemetery of Callistus. The latter was the last of the Popes to be buried in this cemetery; but we hear that S. Marcus (336–7) built two basilicae, in one of which he was buried, and that this was in cymiterio Balbinae Via Ardeatina, and also that S. Damasus (366-384), whose poetical epitaphs, inscribed in the unmistakeable characters invented by Furius Dionysius Philocalus, adorned so many tombs of martyrs, likewise erected a basilica on the Via Ardeatina, in which he was buried with his mother Laurentia and his sister Irene. All these burial-places, as well as the basilica on the Via Ardeatina in which the brothers Marcus and Marcellianus, deacons martyred under Diocletian, were buried sub magno altare, were visited by the pilgrims for whose benefit the itineraries were written; and the materials for their identification have been largely increased by recent excavations. We may take first the discoveries in the Papal crypt itself. To the epitaphs of four1 Popes-SS. Anteros, Fabianus, Lucius, and Eutychianus -discovered by De Rossi has been added a fifth, that of S. Pontianus, who was exiled to Sardinia by Maximinus Thrax, and died of the illtreatment he received there. The fragments which compose it were found in the crypt of S. Cecilia amidst a mass of rubbish, one of them almost at the bottom of a deep well; and we see that in the original inscription, as in that of S. Fabianus, who caused the body of S. Pontianus to be brought from Sardinia and buried here, only the name and title Emok(оTоs), of the Pope were given. At a later date the monogram MP, i. e. μáprup, was added, as it was also in the epitaph of S. Fabianus. De Rossi explained the addition in the latter case by the supposition that the formal vindicatio by which the title of martyr was conferred was postponed owing to the long vacancy which followed the death of Fabianus, and assumed that his successor, S. Cornelius, decreed 1 We do not include that of Urbanus', since it is more than doubtful, for palaeographical reasons, whether it belongs to the Pope of that name. the addition of the monogram: but the discovery of the epitaph of S. Pontianus has made this theory impossible, and Wilpert has further shewn that in the epitaph of S. Cornelius himself the word MARTYR is a later addition. It is difficult to say when the title was added, but it is at least an attractive conjecture that S. Sixtus II and his attendant deacons were the first to be so honoured. The fragmentary inscription ... VS MARTYS found by De Rossi in the Catacomb of Praetextatus is generally thought to refer either to Felicissimus or to Agapitus, who were put to death shortly after the Pope himself. The martyrdom of S. Sixtus has been discussed in a critical spirit by Wilpert, whose opinion finds support in a communication from Mgr Duchesne. The hitherto accepted view, that S. Sixtus was put to death in the Catacomb of Praetextatus, was maintained by De Rossi on very inconclusive grounds. It is true that SS. Felicissimus and Agapitus were buried in that catacomb; but S. Sixtus himself, as well as the four deacons martyred together with him, who are mentioned in a letter written by S. Cyprian1 on the receipt of the news at Carthage, were buried in or near the Papal crypt. This is in fact evident from the two inscriptions there set up by S. Damasus. The epitaph of the Pope himself (Ihm 13), of which three small fragments exist, was clearly intended to adorn his tomb, and the line hic positus rector caelestia iussa docebam is, to say the least, most naturally interpreted as meaning that S. Sixtus was preaching in the crypt itself when arrested; and the second (Ihm 12) which enumerates the saints buried in this region, contains the line hic comites Xysti, portant qui ex hoste tropaea. Unfortunately the name of S. Sixtus did not occur in the first of these inscriptions, and the rector seems to have been in later times identified with S. Stephen, the predecessor of S. Sixtus. This led to almost inextricable confusion in the legendary accounts of these two saints and their martyrdom: but it may be regarded as certain that S. Sixtus was the Pope to whom the place of honour in the Catacomb of Callistus belonged of right. It is the merit of Wilpert to have placed the matter almost beyond reach of doubt by his partial reconstruction of an inscription, of which a number of small fragments have been found at different times, several having been recently identified by Wilpert. The characters belong to the fifth century, but the inscription is clearly copied from one originally composed by S. Damasus-probably by order of Vigilius (537-555), who, as we learn from the well-known inscription found in the Catacomb of SS. Petrus and Marcellinus, did much to repair the 1 Ep. 82. 2 The fragments identified by De Rossi are given in Ihm 17. damage wrought by the Goths under Vitiges. Although not a single line can be restored with certainty, Wilpert has made out a strong case for reading the beginning of the poem thus Dum] populi [re]ct[or r]egis p[ra]ecept[a p]rofa[na Contemnens d]uci[bus missis dat no]bile corpus, where rex obviously refers to Valerian and rector to S. Sixtus. The fragments whose provenance is known were found either at the top or the bottom of the stairway by which the catacomb is entered; and it is natural to assume that it marked the spot where S. Sixtus was actually beheaded, which was of course not in the Papal crypt itself where the arrest was made. Now in the neighbourhood of the stairway there is a small triapsidal building conventionally known as the Basilica of SS. Sixtus and Cecilia; and it is tempting to suppose-as Wilpert doesthat it marks the site of S. Sixtus's martyrdom. An oratorium ubi decollatus est S. Xystus is mentioned in the Itineraries compiled for the use of mediaeval pilgrims; but this was almost certainly on the Via Appia, and much nearer the city than the building mentioned above. It is, however, impossible to discuss Wilpert's view without referring to other discoveries in the neighbouring cemeteries.1 In the region to the north of the cemetery of Callistus proper, not far from the fork of the roads, two crypts were excavated some years ago which were evidently of more than ordinary importance. The first, which was once lined with marble and had four marble-cased columns at the corners, contained a number of formae and loculi; and the epitaph of a lector named Alexius, who is described as resting with the saints', supports the view that the crypt was the burial-place of well-known martyrs. Near to it is a second crypt, which likewise had at one time a marble lining, and has been named the Crypt of the Apostles, from the fact that it contained a fourth-century fresco representing our Lord seated in the midst of His disciples. Amongst the débris with which the crypt was choked was found a small fragment of the inscription set up by S. Damasus in honour of his mother Laurentia, as was proved by the discovery of an imprint of almost the whole inscription on the cement adhering to a large block of travertine buried in the rubbish accumulated in a neighbouring cubiculum a few yards from the Crypt of the Apostles. This cubiculum was lighted by a large lucernarium, and it is of course possible that the block had fallen from above; in any 1 Beneath the Papal crypt there has been discovered a number of galleries, &c., of the third century, excavated in an arenarium, and a vast pile of skeletons arranged in layers with earth between them. It seems probable that they had been removed from earlier tombs in order to make room for those who wished to be buried ad sanctos. No doubt it is to such ossuaria that the itineraries refer when they speak of innumerabilis multitudo martyrum', &c.; in this case they speak of lxxx martyres who rest deorsum, i. e. below the crypt of S. Cecilia. |