necropolis

ART HISTORY ALIVE

WHERE ARE PETER’S BONES:
A MYSTERY OF BIBLICAL SCALE SOLVED
From the 1st century - 1968

For centuries the precious bones of the Apostle Peter were thought to be buried deep down under the alter of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Excavations carried out in secret from 1939 - 1949 uncovered some amazing things but not the Fisherman’s bones. But wait. In 1952 an expert in Greek epigraphy, the deciphering of ancient inscriptions, discovered something that had been missed as well as something missing . . . .

THE NECROPOLIS
An excerpt from A Traveller in Rome, by H. V. Morton
Copyrite 1957

It might be thought that Rome had no more secrets to reveal, but this is not so. During the last war Vatican archaeologists investigated the tomb of St. Peter and revealed what human eyes had not seen since the age of Constantine: a street of pagan tombs beneath the Church.
During the past sixteen centuries traces of the Vatican cemetery have been seen under St. Peter’s on several occasions. The first time was when the old church was pulled down during the Renaissance and the present St. Peter’s was built, and again in 1626 during the construction of the foundations for Bernini’s massive canopy above the high altar. In that year architects were digging all round the central area where the Apostle’s tomb was believed to be, and the Pope, Urban VIII, was asked to decide whether an investigation should be carried out to see if the tombs were intact. There were two points of view: some were anxious to discover if the tomb of St. Peter had been sacked by the Saracens in 846, and others had superstitious fears of disturbing the Apostle’s bones. Two or three unexpected deaths among the excavators seemed to support the fears of those who were quoting the letter which Gregory the Great had written eight centuries before, saying that calamities would attend any who ventured to move sacred relics. Though Urban VIII may not have been among the superstitious, he never the less decided against an investigation, and gave three chief reasons: if the Apostle’s tomb were not discovered, doubt might be cast upon the existence of the body of St. Peter in Rome; that the actual body might not be recognized among the great number of the early popes buried round him; and that, owing to the great age of the tomb and the bones, some damage might accidentally be done. The excavators were therefore forbidden to penetrate beneath the High Alter and had to confine their work to the foundations for the bronze canopy.
Urban’s fear that the tomb of St. Peter might not be found must surely consign to the realm of wishful thinking the story, strangely repeated by many distinguished writers, that it had been seen by chance during the pontificate of Clement VIII - only twenty-eight years before. The story is that during the course of alterations in the crypt, in the spring of 1594, a pavement gave way and through the hole was seen the tomb of St. Peter, with the golden cross of Constantine, which weighed a hundred and fifty pounds, still lying upon it as it had been placed there in the fourth century. Clement VIII is said to have visited the scene at once with Cardinals Bellarmone, Antoniano, and Sfondrati, and to have seen the Apostle’s grave by the light of a torch: he was so moved by the sight that he ordered the tomb to be instantly sealed up. It is an attractive story, but had it been true, Urban VIII would have known about it, for the Vatican still contained many who were alive at the time the incident is said to have occurred.
Such was the archaeological background of the Tomb of St. Peter when Pope Pius XI died in 1939, having expressed a wish to be buried near the tomb of St. Pius X in the over crowded crypt. Immediately the Sanpietrini, the hereditary workmen who for centuries have maintained the structure of St. Peter’s, set about exploring the crypt for a suitable position for his tomb. In the course of their probing, traces again became visible of the pagan cemetery upon which St. Peter’s was built, and again a Pope was asked to decide whether the excavations should be continued. Pius XII made the courageous decision to carry on with the examination as long as the structure of the church was not endangered. So, for ten years, which included the whole period of the Second World War, architects, archaeologists, and about ten members of the Sanpietrini, worked in the greatest secrecy below the nave and the High Alter of St. Peter’s. The official report was issued in Italian in 1951, and the only scholarly account of the excavations in English is The Shrine of St. Peter, by Professor Jocelyn Toynbee and Professor Ward Perkins, Director of the British School in Rome. This book, which is well illustrated, is indispensable to anyone who wishes to understand what has happened underneath St. Peter’s and the new problems presented by the discoveries.
Was St. Peter’s tomb discovered, is the first question which the reader will ask. The answer is yes: but it was not the tomb as Constantine the Great left it. It had been rifled in ancient times. Possibly by the Saracens, and all the traces of the bronze coffin ad the gold cross mentioned in early accounts of the burial have vanished. In the tomb cavity was discovered the headless skeleton of a human being of advance age. Was this the skeleton of St. Peter? No one knows. The cautious Vatican archaeologists have had the bones for several years, yet no statement has been issued about them. **
What then is the result of the Vatican excavations? A street of beautifully decorated Roman tombs has been discovered, running beneath the nave, a street hidden and unseen since Constantine’s workmen built the first church on top of it sixteen centuries ago. Under the high alter of the present church an ancient shrine was discovered whose existence was the reason why the first church was built. On the plaster of the wall near this shrine pilgrims in Roman times had written their names, and one wrote an invocation to St. Peter. Perhaps only a careful archaeologist would hesitate to recognize this shrine as the tomb of the Apostle.
. . . The excavations under St. Peter’s were difficult and delicate: at times picks and spades could not be used and the Sanpietrini had to use their fingers. The foundations of the church, which were discovered to be inadequate, have been reinforced so that St. Peter’s is stronger then ever. The whole street of tombs under the church has been preserved and is lit by electricity. It is possible to walk about it and to enter the tombs, as in some street in Pompeii or Herculaneum. It is, in my opinion, the most wonderful sight in Rome and it is a pity that it can never be shown to large numbers of the public: The space is too confined and the frescoes and wall paintings might easily be damaged. . . . .

** But the story goes on. H. V. Morton’s book, A Traveller in Rome, was printed in 1957 and at that time the bones removed from the spot thought to be Peter’s tomb proved to be a disappointment. The bones were those of two men too young to be Peter, a few from a woman in her 70’s and some animal bones. In March 1959, however, Dr. Margherita Guarducci, a professor of Greek epigraphy at Rome University was brought in to see if she could decipher the ancient graffiti scratched into the walls and shed some light on why Peter’s bones were not in the tomb thought to be his. In 1963, 4 years into what would take 5.5 years of close study, she found, on a nearby wall the greek letters that she was convinced indicated, in early Christian code, “Peter is buried here”, or “Peter is within”. Below is an account of what then transpired regarding this mystery since Mr. Morton's book went to print in 1957, and Dr. Guarducci was brought into this amazing unfolding story in 1959.

Peter in Rome
excerpted from the article of the same name from the Biblical Archaeology Society.

. . But the story does not end there. Inside a forward jutting wall just 2 feet from the earth grave was a stone-lined niche, that had originally been covered over with stone and plaster. It was on this supplementary wall, originally built to stabilize the larger wall when it developed a crack, that the inscription PETROS ENI, Peter is within, had been scratched. What the original excavators never knew was that their supervisor, Monsignor Kaas, who had died in 1952 , had actually found a set of human bones in this concealed niche, along with traces of gold and purple-died cloth. Disapproving of the coldly scientific manner in which the excavators were treating - or he felt, desecrating - the remains that they were finding in the surrounding necropolis, the cleric secretly had his foreman, Giovanni Segoni, remove these bones to a box for safekeeping. They sat forgotten for over a decade in a wooden box in a Vatican storeroom.
In 1963, an epigraher studying the tropaion’s (what was thought to be the grave marker) graffiti, Dr. Margherita Guarducci, learned of Kaas’s secret find. She persuaded the new pope, Paul VI (a friend of her family’s) to allow the bones to be studied. They turned out to come from a large man in his sixties - fitting the description of Peter. The dirt encrusting the bones chemically matched the dirt of the grave below the Tropain, meaning that they had originally been buried there but were moved at some point to this concealed niche in the wall above. The fabric was genuine royal purple stained with expensive dye from the Murex snail and had real gold threads. In June of 1968, Pope Paul VI made an official announcement that St. Peter’s relic had at last been found.
Art History Alive is very proud to offer it’s client’s this walk back in time to a spot 2,000 years old. Through special arrangements with an office of the Vatican we go with an official guide, deep into the past where you will see with your own eyes a 1st century pagan cemetery as your shoes walk along the original Roman road to the very place where tradition and science agree that Peter is buried.

Note: I think that it is very interesting that following the 1968 announcement by Pope Paul VI, airtight containers developed for space exploration were sent as a gift from the United States so that Peter’s bones could be placed inside for protection before the box was then returned to the original tomb, which now can be seen by you.

If you are interested in Dr. Margherita Guarduuci’s findings, in her own words, go to:
www.stpetersbasilica.org/Necropolis/MG/TheTombofStPeter-1.htm