One Reason the Catacombs Are So Important Art History
THE CHRISTIAN CATACOMBS
Origin of the catacombs
Characteristics of the catacombs
Catacombs in Italy and around the globe
The fine art of the catacombs
The catacombs and the Mother of God
The Good Shepherd in the catacombs
The martyrs of the catacombs
The catacombs and the Fathers of the Church
The Pontiffs restore the catacombs
Rome, Catacombs of Priscilla – Gallery of sandstone
Origins of the catacombs. The catacombs originated in Rome between the cease of the second and the start of the tertiary centuries A.D., under the papacy of Pope Zephyrin (199-217), who entrusted to the deacon Callixtus, who would later become pope (217-222), the job of supervising the cemetery of the Appian Way, where the virtually important pontiffs of the tertiary century would be buried. The custom of burying the dead in underground areas was already known to the Etruscans, the Jews and the Romans, only with Christianity much more complex and larger burying hypogea originated in gild to welcome the whole customs in but one necropolis. The ancient term to designate these monuments is coemeterium, which derives from the Greek and means "dormitory", thereby stressing the fact that for Christians, burial is just a temporary moment while they wait for the final resurrection. In artifact, the term catacomb, extended to all the Christian cemeteries, only defined the circuitous of St. Sebastian on the Appian Way.
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Rome, Catacombs of Priscilla – Gallery with closed loculi
Characteristics of the catacombs. The catacombs are, for the most part, excavated in tuff or in other easily removable just solid soils and so as to create a negative compages. For this reason, the catacombs are plant especially where at that place are tufacious types of soil: that is, in central, southern and insular Italy. The catacombs entail the presence of ladders that lead to ambulatories which are chosen galleries, as in mines. In the walls of the galleries the "loculi" are arranged: that is, the burial places of ordinary Christians that are made lengthwise. These tombs are closed with marble slabs or bricks. The loculi represent the humblest and most egalitarian burial organization in gild to respect the customs sense that animated the early Christians. In any effect, in the catacombs more than circuitous tombs are also found, such every bit the arcosolia, which entail the excavation of an arch on the tuff catafalque, and the cubicula, which are real and proper burying chambers.
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Catacombs in Italian republic and around the world. Virtually of the catacombs are found in Rome where they number nearly 60, while the same number can be counted in Latium. In Italy, the catacombs adult especially in the South where the soil consistency is harder simply at the aforementioned fourth dimension more than ductile for excavation. The northernmost catacomb is the ane that developed on the Isle of Pianosa, while the southernmost cemetery hypogea are the ones in northern Africa and especially at Hadrumentum in Tunisia. Other catacombs are plant in Tuscany (Chiusi), Umbria (near Todi), Abruzzi (Amiterno, Aquila), Campania (Naples), Apulia (Canosa), Basilicata (Venosa), Sicily (Palermo, Siracusa, Marsala and Agrigento), and Sardinia (Cagliari, South. Antioco).
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Rome, Catacombs of Priscilla – three children in the furnace
| The art of the catacombs. From the end of the 2d century, an extremely simple fine art adult in the catacombs which is in office narrative and in part symbolic. The paintings, mosaics, reliefs on the sarcophaguses and minor arts call back stories from the Old and New Testaments, as if to present the examples of salvation from the by to the new converts. This is why Jonah is often depicted who was saved from the belly of the whale where he remained for 3 days, which re-evokes Christ's Resurrection. |  Rome. Catacombs of Sts. Marcellinus and Peter – Jonah is vomited out |
| From the New Attestation, the miracles are called of healing (the blind homo, the paralytic, the hemorrhaging adult female) and resurrection (Lazarus, the widow of Naim'due south son, Jairus' girl), merely also other episodes, such as the chat with the Samaritan adult female at the well and the multiplication of the loaves. |
 Rome, Catacombs of St. Sebastian – Funeral inscription with symbols | The art of the catacombs is also a symbolic art in the sense that some concepts which are difficult to express are represented in a unproblematic way. To indicate Christ a fish is depicted; to signify the peace of heaven a dove is represented; to express firmness of religion an anchor is drawn. On the endmost slabs of the loculi, symbols with different meanings are frequently engraved. In some cases, a tool is depicted which indicates the dead person's trade in life. Some symbols, such as glasses, loaves of bread and amphorae, allude to the funeral meals consumed in honor of the deceased, the so-called refrigeria. About of the symbols refer to eternal salvation, such every bit the pigeon, the palm, the peacock, the phoenix and the lamb. |
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Rome, Catacombs of Priscilla – Our Lady with the Prophet
The catacombs and the Mother of God. In the Roman catacombs the most ancient image is preserved of Our Lady who is depicted in a painting in the cemetery of Priscilla on the Via Salaria. The fresco, which can be dated back to the commencement half of the third century, depicts the Virgin with the Child on her knees in front end of a prophet (perhaps Balaam or Isaiah) who is pointing to a star to refer to the messianic prediction. In the catacombs other episodes with Our Lady are as well represented such every bit the Adoration of the Magi and scenes from the Christmas crib, but it is thought that prior to the Council of Ephesus, all these representations had a Christological and not a Mariological significance.
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Rome, Catacombs of Priscilla – The Skilful Shepherd
The Good Shepherd in the catacombs. One of the images represented the most in the art of the catacombs is the Good Shepherd. While the model is taken from pagan culture, it immediately takes on a Christological significance inspired by the parable of the lost sheep. Christ is thus represented as a humble shepherd with a lamb on his shoulders equally he watches over his little flock that is sometimes made upward of only ii sheep placed at his sides.
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Rome, Catacombs of St. Sebastian – devotional graffiti
The martyrs of the catacombs. In the catacombs, the martyrs are cached who were killed during the cruel persecutions willed by Emperors Decius, Valerianus and Diocletian. Around the tombs of the martyrs, a form of devotion developed rapidly among the pilgrims who left their graffiti and prayers at these exceptional burial places. The Christians tried to arrange the burial places of their deceased as close as possible to the martyrs' tombs because it was idea this would also establish a mystical nearness in heaven.
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The catacombs and the Fathers of the Church building. Betwixt the end of the quaternary and the outset of the fifth centuries, the Fathers of the Church described the catacombs. St. Jerome was the first to recount how as a pupil he would go on Sundays to visit the tombs of the apostles and the martyrs together with his study companions: "We would enter the galleries dug into the bowels of the globe…Rare lights coming from to a higher place land adulterate the darkness a little…Nosotros would proceed slowly, 1 step at a time, completely enveloped in darkness". The Iberian poet, Prudentius, also recalls that in the early years of the 5th century, many pilgrims would come up from effectually Rome and even from the surrounding regions to venerate the tomb of the martyr Hippolitus who was buried in the catacombs on the Via Tiburtina.
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The Pontiffs restore the catacombs. In the second half of the fourth century, Pope Damasus began the search for the tombs of the martyrs located in the unlike catacombs of Rome. After the tombs were found, he had them restored and had splendid praises engraved in honor of these first champions of the faith. In the sixth century, Popes Vigilus and John Three likewise restored the catacombs afterwards the incursions due to the Greek-Gothic war. Subsequently, between the eighth and ninth centuries, Popes Hadrian I and Leo II also restored the martyrs' shrines in the Roman catacombs. After a long period of oblivion, the rediscovery of these hypogea in the sixteenth century offered valuable testimonies of the start Christians' genuine faith that were used by the Counterreformation move. Finally, in the nineteenth century, Pope Pius IX created the Committee for Sacred Archaeology in social club to preserve and study in a fitting mode the places of early Christianity.
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Source: https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_commissions/archeo/inglese/documents/rc_com_archeo_doc_20011010_cataccrist_en.html
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