Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/432

containing mosaics, and had windows above. The transept projected beyond the body of the church, a very un usual arrangement. The apse, of remarkably small dimen sions, was screened off by a double row of twelve wreathed columns of Parian marble, of great antiquity, reported to have been brought from Greece, or from Solomon s Temple. The pontifical chair was placed in the centre of the curve of the apse, on a platform raised several steps above the presbytery. To the right and left the seats of the cardinals followed the line of the apse. At the centre of the chord stood the high altar beneath a ciborium, resting on four pillars of porphyry. Beneath the altar was the subterranean chapel, the centre of the devotion of so large a portion of the Chris tian world, believed to con tain the remains of St Peter ; a vaulted crypt ran round the foundation wall of the apse in which many of the popes were buried. The roof showed its naked beams and

rafters.

Fio. 8. Sectional view of the old Basilica of St Peter, before its destruction in the 15th century.

Fia. 9. Ground-Plan of St Paul s, Rome, before its destruction by fire. a, Narthex. 6, Nave. e, c, Side aisles. d. Altar. e. licma. f. Apse.

The basilica of St Paul without the walls, dedicated 324 A.D., rebuilt 388-423, remained in a sadly neglected state, but substantially un altered, till the disastrous fire of 1823, which reduced the nave to a calcined ruin. Its plan and dimensions were almost identical with those of St Peter s, as will be seen from the annexed woodcuts. Its double aisles were formed by four colonnades, each of twenty Corinthian pillars, 33 feet high, all supporting arches. Of these pillars twenty-four were of the best period of Roman art, taken from the mausoleum of Augustus, or from the basilica ^Emilia. The contrast between them and those of the 5th century, standing side by side with them, shows how greatly art had declined. As at St Peter s, the walls above the arches were lined with a double row of mosaic panels, below which was a band of circles containing portraits of the popes, from St Peter downwards. The transept was parted from the nave by a solid wall, with openings pierced in it, and in later times was divided down the middle by a transverse colonnade. The high altar rose above a crypt, or confessio, traditionally believed to be the catacomb of Lucina, a noble Roman Christian matron, to which the body of the apostle Paul had been removed 251 A.D. The narthex was external. St Paul s had completely lost its atrium. The bronze doors, covered with scriptural reliefs, had becnbrought from Constantinople.

Fid. 10. Section of the Basilica of St Paul, Rome.

The only parts of the modernized five- aisled basilica of St John Lateran (of which we have a plan in its original state, Agincourt, pi. Ixxiii. No. 22) which retain any interest, are the double vaulted aisle which runs round the apse, a most unusual arrangement, and the baptistery. The latter is an octagonal building standing some little distance from the basilica to the south. Its roof is supported by a double range of columns, one above the other, encircling the baptismal basin sunk below the floor.

Of the three-aisled basilicas the best example is the Liberian or St Mary Major s, dedicated 365, and re constructed 432 A.D. Its internal length to the chord of the apse is 250 feet, by 100 feet in breadth. The Ionic pillars of grey granite, uniform in style, twenty on each side, form a colonnade of great dignity and beauty, unfortunately broken towards the east by intrusive arches opening into chapels. The clerestory, though modern, is excellent in style and arrangement. Corinthian pilasters divide the windows, beneath which are very remarkable mosaic pictures of subjects from Old Testament history, generally supposed to date from the pontificate of Sixtus III., 432-440. The face of the arch of triumph pre sents also a - series of mosaics illustrative of the infancy of our Lord, of great value in the history of art. The apse is of later date, reconstructed by Paschal I. in 818.

The Sessorian basilica, now St Cross (Santa Croce in Gerusalemme), is of exceptional arrangement. Originally a hall of the palace known as Sessorium, it was granted by Constantino for the purposes of Christian worship, and a vast apse, nearly the whole breadth of the hall, was added at the east end. The side walls are pierced by two tiers of large arched openings, originally communicating with a second range of aisles. Of these the lower range has been built up, but the upper is still open, forming im mense windows.

Among the remaining basilicas of Rome those of St

Lawrence (S. Lorenzo fuori le Mura) and St Agnes deserve special mention, as exhibiting a gallery corresponding to those of the civil basilicas and to the later triforium, carried above the aisles and returned across the west end. The architectural history of St Lawrence s is curious. When originally constructed, 578-590, it consisted of a short nave of six bays, with an internal narthex the whole height of the building. In the 13th century Honorius III. dis orientated the church, by pulling down the apse, and erecting a nave of twelve bays on its site and beyond it, thus con verting the original nave into a square-ended choir, the level being much raised, and the magnificent Corinthian columns half buried. As a consequence of the church being thus shifted completely round, the face of the arch of triumph, turned away from the present entrance, but towards the original one, is invested with the usual mosaics (Agincourt, pi. xxviii. Nos. 29, 30, 31). The basilica of St Agnes, 625-638, of which we give a plan and section, is a small but interesting building, much like what

St Lawrence s must have been before it was altered. From