CHRISTIAN
706
CHRISTIAN
bourers accidentally discovered (31 May, 1578), on
the Via Salaria an ancient subterranean cemetery
containing inscriptions and frescoes of an unmis-
takably Christian character. Among the first to
visit the newly-discovered cemetery was the eccle-
siastical historian Baronius, who, though he recog-
nized the importance of the find, yet took no part
in contemporary explorations. He had, however,
already commenced his great historical work, " An-
nates Ecclesiastic! ", the composition of which
absorbed his whole attention. For fifteen years
after the discovery on the Via Salaria the only
persons to attempt any explorations in the cata-
combs were a Spanish Dominican, Alfonso Ciacconio,
and two Flemish laymen, Philip de Winghe and
Jean PHeureux. Ciacconio accomplished nothing of
importance. The investigations of the two Flemish
explorers gave promise of better results, but their
writings remained unpublished, and consequently
had no influence on their contemporaries.
The first to begin the systematic exploration of the ancient Roman cemeteries or catacombs, was the "Father of Christian Archaeology", Antonio Bosio. Born in Malta in 1575, Bosio was placed at an early age under the care of an uncle who resided at Rome, as procurator of the Knights of Malta. At the age of eighteen he was attracted to the study of the early Christian sepulchral monuments of Rome, and from that date till his death, in 1629, a period of thirty-six years, he devoted his life to the exploration of the catacombs. Three years after his death (1632), the results of his in- vestigations and studies were made known to the world in an Italian work entitled " Roma Sotterranea", edited by the Oratorian Severano, and published at the expense of the Order of Malta. The great merit of this work was at once recognized, and led to the publication by Aringhi, in 1651, of a Latin transla- tion for the benefit of the savants of Europe. The scientific character of Bosio's explorations has re- cently been confirmed by an interesting discovery. De Rossi, in spite of his admiration for Bosio, main- tained that the cemetery of Sts. Mark and Mar- cellianus, in which Pope Damasus was interred, lay to the right of the Via Ardeatina, and not to the left, as Bosio believed. In 1902 both the crypts of Pope Damasus and of Sts. Mark and Marcellianus were discovered by Wilpert, and in the locality in- dicated by Bosio. Important as was the work of Bosio, it was, however, in one department defective. The copies of catacomb paintings made for his "Roma Sotterranea" have been very often found by Wilpert to be quite inaccurate. This fault must be attributed to Bosio's copyists.
For more than two centuries after the death of Bosio, little advance was made in the exploration of the Roman catacombs, the great treasure-house of the monuments of primitive Christianity. Prot- estant writers either altogether ignored the dis- coveries of Bosio or refuted them to their own satisfaction, without ever having seen the monu- ments. Even Bingham, whose work on Christian Antiquities was published nearly a century after the first edition of Bosio's work appeared, made no use of the results of his investigations. Yet Catholic authors scarcely showed more appreciation of the monuments than their Protestant contemporaries. Unlike De Rossi in our own age, Bosio founded no school of trained archaeologists to cany on the work he so happily inaugurated; the consequence of which was that all systematic exploration ceased at his death. Fabretli, in his collection of inscriptions published in 1699, devoted only one chapter (viii) to Christian inscriptions. Twenty-one years later, Boldetti, who held the office of custodian of the catacombs, published an apologetic work of little Value on the "Cemeteries of the holy Martyrs and
ancient Christians of Rome". A work of Buonarotti
on cemeterial glasses (Florence, 1716) is of greater
merit. But the eighteenth century will be longer
remembered for the destruction of Christian monu-
ments than for the labours of its archaeologists.
Under the direction of Boldetti numerous inscrip-
tions were removed from the places where they were
originally erected, and scattered through various
Roman churches, without any clear indication of
the localities from which they were taken. These
inscriptions were afterwards collected by Bene-
dict XIV (1740-58) in the Christian Museum of the
Vatican, of which he was founder. Many invaluable
frescoes, also, were injured or destroyed during the
eighteenth century. It would be natviral to expect
that the establishment of a department in con-
nexion with the Vatican Library for the collection of
Christian inscriptions and other relics of the early
Church would arouse the curiosity of Roman anti-
quarians. Such is not the fact, however. For
several years after the death of Benedict XIV no
one took any interest in the catacombs. In view
of later occurrences it was, perhaps, as well that this
was the case. About 1780, S6roux d'Agincourt
(q. v.) visited several of the ancient cemeteries, and
copied for publication in his " Histoire de l'art par
les monuments " (Paris, 1823), a number of catacomb
frescoes. But M. d'Agincourt was not always satis-
fied with copies. Following the example of other
explorers in the same field, he was too often desirous
of obtaining the original paintings, and thus inaugur-
ated a more systematic destruction of monuments
than any of his predecessors.
With the first half of the nineteenth century began a new epoch in archaeological studies. The work of M. Raoul Rochette " Discours sur l'origine etc. des types qui constituent l'art du Christianisme " (Paris, 1834), and his "Tableau des Catacombes de Rome" (Paris, 1837) had the merit of arousing inter- est in the Christian monuments of Rome, although his conclusions were not at all convincing. In Italy, Sarti, Settele, Pasquini, De Minicis, Valentini. Man- ara, Cordero, and others produced works of minor importance on the subterranean-eemeterial monu- ments, the Christian sarcophagi, and the early basilicas of their country. The honour of inaugur- ating really important work, however, belongs to the Jesuit Father Marchi. Marchi was the first to demonstrate the essential difference between the arenaria, or sand-pits in the vicinity of Rome, and the galleries of the catacombs. In 1S41 he pub- lished the first volume of what he intended to be an exhaustive work on early Christian art; for various reasons he was unable to complete the undertaking. But Marchi had associated with him, from the time he began to devote particular attention to the Christian monuments of Rome (1841), a young man, not yet twenty years of age, who was destined to take up the work of Bosio and elevate Christian archaeology to the dignity of a science. This was Giovanni Battista De Rossi (1822-94). The first important work undertaken by De Rossi (q. v.) was a collection of the Christian inscriptions of Rome prior to the seventh century (Koine, 1S61 SM. While engaged in collecting materials for this great work, the young archaeologist had frequent occasion to visit the catacombs. His observations soon con- vinced him that the real work of exploring these venerable sanctuaries of Christian antiquity had merely been commenced by previous investigators, and that results of the greatest interest and im- portance for the history of the early Church might De obtained by systematic investigations carried out on scientific principles. No one was better qualified than himself to execute his plans, a fact recognized by Pope Pius IX, who commissioned him to begin the work destined to be so fruitful in results.
