Five Transliterated Aramaic Inscriptions 9781607244592, 1607244594

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Five Transliterated Aramaic Inscriptions

A n a l e c t a Gorgiana

230 Series Editor George Kiraz

Analecta Gorgiana is a collection of long essays and

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Five Transliterated Aramaic Inscriptions

William Romaine Newbold

1 gorgia* press 2009

Gorgias Press LLC, 180 Centennial Ave., Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA www.gorgiaspress.com Copyright © 2009 by Gorgias Press LLC Originally published in All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise without the prior written permission of Gorgias Press LLC. 2009

1

ISBN 978-1-60724-459-2

ISSN 1935-6854

Extract from The A^merican Journal of Archaeology, vol. 30 (1926).

Printed in the LTnited States of America

archaeological

institute of America

F I V E T R A N S L I T E R A T E D ARAMAIC I N S C R I P T I O N S

1

THE first two of the five inscriptions here translated and discussed were found in Pompeii many years ago; the other three have been found under the church of San Sebastiano in Rome during the excavations which have there been made since 1915. Four are written in Latin characters, one in Greek. Several excellent scholars, assuming that the language is Latin, have tried to translate them, but none of the proposed translations makes good sense or has met with general acceptance. It does not seem to have occurred to anyone that the language might not be Latin. And yet there would have been nothing inherently improbable in the hypothesis. In the vast and polyglot population of Italy, and especially of Rome, there must have been many persons who might take a fancy to write their native tongues in an alphabet recently acquired, just as a modern school-boy often first uses his Greek alphabet to write his own name and sentences in his own language. Moreover, it is likely that a certain glamour was cast by the Greek and Latin alphabets on the eyes of the peoples subject to the Empires of Alexander and of Rome, arousing a sentiment similar to that which prompted many Roman Christians to write the Latin epitaphs of their dead in the Greek alphabet because Greek was the language of their Scriptures and of their liturgy and to that which makes us today prefer mediaeval lettering for legends in our churches. Read as Latin these inscriptions make no sense, but if pronounced as Aramaic they would be, I think, intelligible to any one who understood the language, although perhaps with some difficulty. A number of Aramaic consonants either cannot be represented at all or are represented imperfectly by Latin or Greek letters, and the vowel sounds of the inscriptions differ slightly from those of the traditional pronunciation. Yet I think that any one, whether acquainted with Aramaic or not, who will compare with the text of the inscriptions the traditional pronunciation given below them, will be convinced that the resemblance between them is not a mere matter of accident. 1 1 have made 110 effort to search for such inscriptions. While reading Manzini's article (Bibliography, No. 33) I observed that I I I and IV were written in Aramaic, and read a paper on them at the meeting of the American Oriental Society in Philadelphia, April 7, 1926. On the preceding Sunday, April 4, I encountered V in Styger's report (No. 21) and made a rough translation of it. While preparing material on these three I ran across I and I I in the same casual way. No doubt others will be discovered. I owe a debt of gratitude to my friend and colleague Prof. James Alan Montgomery, who has put at my disposal his intimate knowledge of the various Aramaic languages by criticizing my translations, correcting some errors and pointing out a number of disputable questions upon which more evidence was needed, but it must not be inferred that he indorses all my opinions.

288

NEW BOLD: FIVE TRANSLITERATED

INSCRIPTIONS

289

If the words be taken as Aramaic, the ideas attaching to them blend one with the other into coherent, logical sense. Still more, they blend in like manner with the meanings of the Latin words with which, in four cases out of the five, they are associated. In Nos. I, III, and V Latin words are inset into the Aramaic text, yet are continuous with it both in syntax and in thought. No. II is the third line of a four line inscription of which the other three lines are in Latin, but its meaning is appropriate to that of the other three. Again, the ideas of these inscriptions are those of the period in which they were written, and are appropriate to the special circumstances under which they were written, as far, at least, as we are able to reconstruct those circumstances. The first was scrawled by a pagan on the wall of a room in Pompeii in which a Christian missionary had taught, and it sets forth a view of the Christian propaganda which is known to have been that of many pagans in the early Christian centuries. The third implies beliefs as to the experiences of the soul after death which were at that time widely held both by Christians and non-Christians. The fourth, which occurs on an epitaph, gives the Aramaic equivalents of two words which occur very frequently on Roman epitaphs but which this one lacks. The fifth is confirmed in the main by the inscription of Pope Damasus, by the traditions preserved in the apocryphal martyrdoms, in Gregory of Tours and Panvinio, and, last but not least, by the archaeological evidence unearthed by Dr. Paul Styger and by Prof. Gioacchino Mancini. Since the content of these inscriptions, especially I, III, and V, will be of interest to many who are not acquainted with Aramaic a few words of explanation may not be out of place. The "traditional" pronunciation is that handed down by the vowel-points. There are two systems of pointing: that generally used is of Palestinian origin; the other, the "Yemenite" system, used by the Jews of southern Arabia, is believed to preserve the oldest pronunciation, that of about the seventh century. But the tradition has not been guarded with the care lavished upon MSS. of the Hebrew text; both in MSS. and in most printed editions the pointing exhibits numerous inconsistencies. The first and second inscriptions may be dated about the year 79, the third is probably of the late second century, the fourth of the middle of the third, the fifth of the end of the third. One might, therefore, expect them to differ from the pronunciation of the seventh century. Moreover, they are, presumably, not written by scholars but by quite ordinary people, and might present some peculiarities of the local dialects which are known to have existed. It is, therefore, surprising to find that they differ so little from the standard pronunciation. Such differences as exist are largely mere

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matters of spelling, the sound of the words being nearly the same. Furthermore, these differences, with one exception (No. V, " i c t o " for icetu) are of types known to have existed. For example, the vowel called in Hebrew Kamez, in I is written a, in I I I and V, o; the same diversity still exists, for the Jews of central and eastern Europe and the Jacobite Syrians still pronounce it o, while the Spanish Jews and the Nestorian Syrians pronounce it a. Again, the letters bgdkpt each have two sounds which in Hebrew are distinguished in accordance with certain rules, but these rules are not observed in Samaritan, and in Syriac only with many exceptions; in the inscriptions only two of these sounds are recognized, b and v, p and /, but they do not conform to the rules. So also of the confusion between w and b or v, which occurs in MSS. as well as in the inscriptions, of hesitation between u and o, which still exists as regards some words, of transposition of an r and the adjacent vowel, as in the English, work and wrowght, pretty and perty, brother and brethren, children and childern. Each inscription is given in four forms: (1) Transcribed literally, except that capital and cursive letters are not distinguished; (2) the same transcription with the word-divisions of Aramaic introduced and (3) the traditional pronunciation beneath it in italics; (4) the same pronunciation in Hebrew characters with vowelpoints. In constructing (3) and (4) I have not attempted to represent all the sounds recognized in Hebrew. Three vowel-quantities are indicated: The very short sewa mobile and the "snatched" vowel, as in "away," "beneath," "c5nnect," is marked short. The ordinary short vowel, as in "enemy," "facility," is left unmarked. The long vowel, as in "wall," "gold," "machine," is marked long. Certain consonants not distinguished in the inscriptions and usually not pronounced by Western scholars are introduced for the sake of clearness. The gutturals ' Alef ' and ' Ain' are as a rule not pronounced at all; i, s, k are pronounced like the corresponding English letters; h is a harsh, guttural h, something like the German ch; s is the English sh. The introduction of these letters, however, probably in some cases exaggerates the differences between the inscriptions and the traditional pronunciation, since at the time the inscriptions were written some of these letters were ignored or confused as they now are by modern Jews. When tradition testifies to different pronunciations, that is adopted in the second line which is nearest to the text of the inscription. Thus, in I, Kamez is written a, in I I I and V o. Waw is v in all except IV where it is w because it is represented in that inscription

NEWBOLD:

FIVE TRANSLITERATED

INSCRIPTIONS

291

by on. The second pronunciation of b and p is written, as in the inscriptions, v and/. In transliterating Hebrew and Aramaic elsewhere, without reference to the inscriptions, I have followed the same rules except that I write Kamez as a and Waw as w. No. I. In 1864 J. B. De Rossi published in his Bulletino, p. 71, a drawing made by Minervini (Fig. 1) of a graffito which had been found in 1862 traced in charcoal on the wall of a room in a Pompeian house. Since the word HRISTIAN or CHRISTIAN was unmistakable, it was at once realized that the inscription was the earliest non-Christian reference to the Christian religion, and many efforts have been made to decipher it. An account of them, with refer-

v

I /V

A . A K J

A

A

AD/A jjcvic (a!oi

o!U/7JAAJ ©xi

* FIGUBE

1.

\i c

POMPEIAN GRAFFITO

y

; • (De Rossi, Bull.,

1864,

p. 71)

ences to the literature, will be found in Dom Le Clercq's article Graffites in D.A.C.L., VI, 1482-4. Dom Le Clercq thinks De Rossi's interpretation is still the best, although far from satisfactory, Audi Christianos sevos o(J)ores, "Hear the Christians, the fierce swans." No attempt is made to translate the other words. At the time of De Rossi's publication the original had been totally erased. Two drawings had been made, the first by Kiessling, the second by Minervini. Zangemeister (C.I.L., IV, Tab. XVI) gives both, but in his text (No. 679) prefers Kiessling's, perhaps because it has somewhat more resemblance to Latin. The two agree in the first two lines, and these lines contain two words which make sense if taken as Aramaic. Minervini's copy of the remaining lines, taken as Aramaic, makes sense which develops and completes the meaning of the first two, while Kiessling's does not. Moreover, the text thus completed not only makes against the Christians a charge which we know from other sources to have been made against them, but is also in keeping with other graffiti found in the same

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room. There is, then, good ground for accepting Minervini's copy as in the main trustworthy, although not as necessarily correct in all details. Text: vina aaria rdia .a. v dec vigGav dichristianos siivoso onis X ivc p. (?) p. (?) vina a a r i a r d i a A. blna

ahraya

redla

'«

s

be-gav

di

P. (?) Populo

enls

Christianos

"J

P'n"ji

Christianos

ii voso onis csi uc

seyyihbusu

T ?

A.

vd ec vigGav di Christianos udhek

«V31?*

•"»'71

pi nips

B^IK

lBian'tf

kishok

P- (?) (?) Pompeiano

(?)

" A strange mind has driven A. and he has pressed in among the Christians who make a man a prisoner as a laughing-stock [to the people of Pompeii?!." Notes on text: aaria: i.e. aharya for the traditional aharaya. In the Yemen pointing the "snatched" vowel following a guttural is often omitted (Dalman, Grammatik des Jiidisch-Palastinischen Aramdisch, 2te Aufl. (1905), p. 93/.) giving ahraya, which I have adopted as the representative of tradition. Transposition of the r and the adjacent vowel occurs also in II, ''torgc" for tSrdgik and in Y, "u/ierb" for uhreb. rdia: The first letter I take as r, not as p. The two are often difficult to distinguish, but the uppsr stroke of both should be over the top of the shaft or near it, not below it, as here. An example of an r exactly like this one will, however, be found in Van Hoesen, Roman Cursive Writing, Princeton Univ. Press, 1915, Table B, sixth r, taken from the lead tablets. The verb is pf. 3. s. f. agreeing with bina. In the Palestinian dialect it would end in -at, in the Babylonian in -a, but in each the form proper to the other occasionally occurs (Dalman, p. 254, §60, 1; Levias, Grammar of the Aramaic Idiom contained in the Babylonian Talmud (1900), §200). For the use of the intransitive form of the perfect with transitive meaning and of the transitive with intransitive meaning see Dalman, p. 249, §59, 1; 337, §72, 2. Levias, §531. Gen. 25, 28, O, J I ; Ex. 34, 28, O. Levias refers (§536d) to an illustration which provides a close

NEW BOLD: FIVE

TRANSLITERATED

INSCRIPTIONS

293

parallel both in form and in meaning to "rdia": bShab. 26a2, hahi hamdta dahawat sent'a lah lekallStah, "The mother-in-law who hated her daughter-in-law." (For the compound tense, as in Syriac, see Dalman, p. 257, 6.) dec: The first character is a monogram of which the second element is an e. The first may be read either as b or as d, the one having been corrected into the other. The writer probably first made a D with an incurve on the right for the crossbar of the E; then, observing that his D might be read as B, he flattened out the curve somewhat. The last letter may be either C or 0 . The context shows some verb of motion is needed, and dehek suits both text and context. But the reading is uncertain and a better suggestion may be forthcoming. vigGav: The capital G probably marks the beginning of the noun, an anticipation of modern usage. The doubling of the g is due to analogy with miggav. siivoso: The late Hebrew relative si- followed by a doubled consonant is not used in Aramaic; its presence here must be explained as a survival of Hebrew influence in the Aramaic of Palestine. According to Dalman (pp. 85-6), the sequence deyi-, leyi-, etc., usually pronounced di-, li-, etc., was pronounced by the Yemenite Jews dii-, Hi-, etc., which seems to be the pronunciation here indicated for sSyyi-. yihbusu for yihblsu has many parallels (Levias, §251, 2; Speiser, Secondary Developments in Semitic Phonology in Am. Jour, of the Semitic Languages, 42 (1926), p. 159). The final o for u in the 3. pi. m. of the strong verb is not recognized by tradition, although I have seen one occurrence of it in the Targums Gen. 42, 8, 0 , JI, we-innun la, istemod'ohi, "and they did not know him." It occurs also in an impf. in No. Y. "icto". It is, however, not surprising in view of the hesitation of tradition between these two sounds in the pronunciation of many words. So also of o and u in the second syllable of the imperfect; according to Dalman (p. 267) o, as here, is the more common in the Yemenite pointing, but both are used indiscriminately. Minervini's drawing suggests t h a t the letters were first made as m's and were then changed into o's by putting bows over the tops. The impf. here is that of the generalized assertion. onis: Compare "(o?)nis" in No. V. Tradition preserves several pronunciations of this word, inis, enis, ends, nas, but I know of no example of 6nis. X iuc: Of the third letter only two fragments remain, but they seem to be the arms of a V. The " X " cannot be a cross, as all early crosses are of the T form. "Xiuc" illustrates the variations which existed, before usage had become crystallized, in the pronunciation of two vowelless consonants; kshiilc is here pronounced ksihuk, but the grammarians finally decided upon kishulf or kisholf. SSwa is given the least duration possible, for in three words it is ignored altogether, "rdia," "udftec," "csifcuc." P (?) P (?): The last two letters, which are marked as abbreviations, can be nothing but L. L., for which I can find no meaning. But if one could suppose that Minervini has unduly prolonged the left hand strokes upward, one would have P. P., which might be taken as Populo Pompeiano and would make excellent sense.

Notes on the translation: bina aaria: The phrase bind ahraya, a "strange" or "alien" understanding or mind is not old Semitic; there one would have "heart" or "spirit," e.g. Num. 14, 24 [Caleb will enter the land], "because another (Targ. ohari) spirit was with him," and 1 Sam. 10, 9 [When Saul met the prophets], "God gave him another heart." But in later times the mental faculties were distinguished from the organs in which they were situated, e.g., bBer. 10a the chest is called "the place of bind." And among Christians (Apocryphal 4cfs, ed. Wright, I, p. 194; Tischendorf and Bonnet, Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha = A.A.A., II, 1, p. 61)

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[the inhabitants of the city gave the stranger] "a cup mixed with magic, and as soon as he drank of that cup his heart was changed and he lost his mind and acquired the heart of a beast." Here the older and the more modern terminology are used side by side. Usually the names of the mental functions are used; see e.g. bina, da'at, madda' in Levy and Jastrow and the section on mental diseases in Preuss, Biblische Talmudische Medicin (Berlin, 1911), pp. 356-69. A frequent term for mental derangement is to "lose one's mind" (e.g. Ben Sira, ed. Peters, 3, 13), or to "change one's mind" (e.g. of old men, bShab. 152a, middle). Since the writer of the inscription obviously knows Latin the phrase may reflect the Latin aliena mens, of which it would be a close translation. siivoso: The verb hébas or hams properly means "to confine," "imprison," and hence is not equivalent to á?or, which is the technical term for binding by a magic spell. The writer is thinking of the Christian converts spending long hours listening to their "apostle" or missionary in the small room in which he is writing, the same spectacle which inspired another graffito found in the same room (De Rossi, I.e.; C.I.L. IV, No. 2016, Tab. XVI, 12): MTJLTJS HIC MUSCELLAS DOCUIT.

The eager hearers crowding about their teacher suggest to the writer a swarm of little flies drawn by some inexplicable attraction to an offensive mule. Two representations of Christian teachers as mules, with references to the literature, will be found in D.A.C.L., I, figures 586, 587, and in the Acts of Judas Thomas there are many allusions to the Apostle's custom of spending his time indoors, receiving all who wished to come and often holding them all day long by the charm of his words.

Commentary: The best illustrations of the writer's sentiments towards the Christian missionaries, of which the inscription gives a glimpse, are afforded by the apocryphal acts. The charm which the preaching of the new religion exerted upon the minds of multitudes, was, to those not affected by it, obviously the work of magic; the apostles were wizards whb cast a spell upon their hearers, depriving them of the use of their understanding and forcing them to believe preposterous absurdities. Thus, while Paul was preaching in the house of Onesiphorus (A.A.A., I, p. 240 sq.) a maiden named Thecla sat at the window of an adjacent house and listened to him for three days and three nights without rising from the window either to eat or to drink, so that her mother marvelled how such a maiden's modesty is by violence beset (xaXexws ivoxXeirai). . . . My daughter like a spider in the window is bound by his words, and is overcome by a novel desire and a terrible passion (-irbñtí 8av¿¡>), for she is so intent upon the things he talks about that she, a maiden, is kept "prisoner (árevífei y¿p rots \eyof¿h>ois iir' avrov i¡al éáXuTtu 4 7r ap& kvos).

In the Acts of Judas Thomas, Karish, husband of the beautiful Mygdonia, assumes as a matter of course that his wife has been bewitched. The story is too long even to be summarized, but a few passages will suffice to show his point of view (Wright, I, p. 263 sq.):

NEWBOLD:

FIVE TRANSLITERATED

INSCRIPTIONS

295

Be not led away by foolish and rambling talk, nor yet by those spells of magie which thou hast heard he does by the Name of his god. . . . This foreigner's magic. . . . By compulsion he controls and casts into the depths those high in place. . . . Mygdonia, whose reason he has taken away. . . . Her face was quivering and her clothes rent and she was like a mad woman because of Judas. . . . Why hast thou become a laughing-stock (gühkä) throughout the whole country. I n t h e s e few q u o t a t i o n s all t h e ideas of t h e P o m p e i a n inscription find expression. A d i s t u r b a n c e of m i n d imposed b y magic f r o m w i t h o u t d e s t r o y s t h e v i c t i m ' s power of j u d g m e n t a n d b i n d s his will, so t h a t he is forced t o seek t h e m a g i c i a n ' s c o m p a n y a n d t o believe his nonsense, t h u s v i r t u a l l y becoming his prisoner a n d a laughings t o c k t o all t h a t k n o w him. No. I I . A n o t h e r graffito f r o m P o m p e i i will b e f o u n d in C.I.L., IV, N o . 760, T a b . X V I , 5. T h e first, second a n d f o u r t h lines a r e L a t i n a n d a r e intelligible. T h e t h i r d line, no longer visible w h e n t h e facsimile was m a d e , is given as: T C L O f T O R G C , which, if one tries t o p r o n o u n c e it, proves t o be n e a r l y identical in sound with t h e A r a m a i c words tiId of tërôgïk

ìj'Jiip

M^pn

T h e only i m p o r t a n t difference is t h e t r a n s p o s i t i o n of t h e r a n d o, T O R G - f o r ierög- (see n o t e on I, " a a r i a " ) . T h e p r o n o m i n a l suffix is feminine, t h e v e r b masculine, b u t in T a l m u d i c A r a m a i c could b e a d d r e s s e d t o a w o m a n (Levias, §234), as is t h e r e m a i n d e r of t h e inscription. T h e m e a n i n g of t h e words is in perfect accord w i t h t h a t of t h e o t h e r lines, b u t t h e i r obscenity p r e v e n t s discussion. BIBLIOGRAPHY

The literature is already large; the following list contains no works published before 1909, excepting the first two. Thosé which I know by title only are marked*. Abbreviations: P.A. =Pontificia Accademia Romana della Archeologìa. Diss. = Dissertazioni. D.A.C.h. = Dictionnaire d'Archéologie Chrétienne et de Liturgie, publié sous la direction du Rme Dom Fernand Cabrol, Abbé de Farnborough et de Dom Henri Le Clercq, T. I-VII, fase. 71 (1926), A—Inscriptions. Bull. = Nuovo Bulletino di archeologia cristiana. R.Q.S. —Römische Quartalschrift. H. T.S. — The Harvard Theological Review. (1) Barnes, A. S.: St. Peter in Rome, London, 1900. (Somewhat out of date but still useful.) (2) Colagrossi, M.: Il sepolcro apostolico nel secolo III della Chiesa, Rome, 1908, pp. 37. (3) Colagrossi, M.: La crittà di un martire, Rome, 1909, pp. 42. (4) Colagrossi, M. : Di un monumento, etc. in Bull. 15 (1909), pp. 51-61, Tav. II-VI. (5) Gatti, G. : Cubiculo cristiano scoperto, etc. in Bulletino della Commissione archeologica comunale di Roma, 1909, pp. 290-318; 304-5. (6) Thurston, H.: A New Book on St. Peter's, London, 1909. (7) *Lietzmann, H.: Petrus und Paulus in Rom, Bonn, 1915. (8) Duchesne, L. : Notes sur la topographie de Rome au moyen âge: La tombe apostolique, in Mélanges d'arch. et d'hist., 35 (1915), pp. 1-13.

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Styger, Paul: Scavi a San Sebastiano, in R.Q.S., 29 (1915), pp. 73-110, Tav. I-IV. (Preliminary report on the results of his excavations.) Styger, Paul: Gli Apostoli Pietro e Paolo ad Catacumbas sulla Via Appia, Ibid., pp. 149-205. (History of the local tradition.) Fasiolo, 0 . : La pianta di San Sebastiano, Ibid., pp. 206-220. Plan and Tav. I - I I I . Grossi Gondi, F.: Il Refrigerium celebrato in onore dei SS. Apostoli Pietro e Paolo nel sec. IV ad Catacumbas, Ibid., pp. 221-249. Marucchi, O. : Notizie sulle recenti scoperte, etc. in Bull. d. Comm. arch. com. d. Roma, 1916, pp. 249-78, Tav. X I and 7 figures in text. Marucchi, O. : Ulteriori osservazioni, etc. Ibid., 1916, pp. 145-60. Profumo, A. : La memoria monumentale in Catacumhis, in Studi Romani, I I (1914, published 1916), pp. 415-70. Lanciani, R. : The "Memoria Apostolorum" on the Appian Way, in The Dublin Review, 158 (1916), pp. 220-29. Marucchi, O. : Le recente scoperte, etc. in Bull, 22 (1916), pp. 1-61, Tav.

Marucchi, O. : Nuove osservazioni, etc. in Bull. 22 (1916), pp. 159-191. Grossi Gondi, F. : S. Fabiano Papa e Martire: La sua tomba e le sue spoglie attraversi i secoli, in Civiltà Cattolica, 1916, voi. 2, pp. 73-81; 209-18; 685-700. (20) Marucchi, O.: Ulteriore studio, etc. in Bull. 23 (1917), pp. 47-87, Tav. II-VII. (21) Styger, P.: Il monumento apostolico della Via Appia, in Diss. P. A. Ser. I I , 13 (1918), pp. 3-112, Tav. I - X X V I , two plans and many figures in text. (Main report upon the excavations conducted by himself and Fasiolo.) (22) Rockwell, W. W.: The latest discussion on Peter and Paul in Rome, in The American Journal of Theology, 22 (1918), pp. 113-24. (23) Lanciani, R. : La Memoria Apostolorum, in Diss. P. A. Ser. II, 14 (1920), pp. 57-111, Tav. VIII-rX. (Bibliography of 70 titles.) (24) Ratti, A. (Pope Pius X I ) : Di un documento relativo alla Basilica di S. Sebastiano in Roma, Ibid., pp. 139-46. (Important addition to the evidence collected by Styger in No. 10.) (25) Marucchi, O. : La Memoria sepolchrale, etc. Ibid., pp. 249-60. (26) Grossi Gondi, F. : Il rito funebre del Refrigerium, etc. Ibid., pp. 263-77. (27) Marucchi, O. : La Memoria sepolchrale, etc. in Bull. 26 (1920), pp. 5-29, 38-9, Tav. I-IV. (28) • Marucchi, O.: L'Ipogeo con i graffiti, etc., in Bull. 27 (1921), pp. 3-14, Tav. I-VI, pp. 112-17. (29) Kirsch, J. P.: Das neuentdeckte Denkmal, etc. in R.Q.S., 30 (1915-21), pp. 5-28, Taf. I. (30) La Piana, G. : The Tombs of Peter and Paul ad Catacumbas, in H.T.S., 14 (1921), pp. 53-94. (31) Marucchi, O.: Gli ultimi scavi, etc. in Bull. 28 (1922), pp. 3-26, Tav. I-III. (32) Grossi Gondi, F. : Di un graffito greco, etc. Ibid., pp. 27-31. (33) Mancini, G. : Scavi sotto la basilica di S. Sebastiano sulla Appia, in Notizie degli scavi, Ser. II, Voi. 20 (1923), pp. 3-79, Tav. I-XVI, 26 figures in text. (Main report upon the Italian Government excavations conducted by Fornari and Mancini.) (34) Marucchi, O. : Note sulle memorie cristiane, etc. Ibid., pp. 80-103, Tav. XVII-XVIII. (Report upon excavations adjacent to the church conducted by the Pontificia Commissione di archeologia sacra in conjunction with the Government.) (35) Lietzmann, H. : The Tomb of the Apostles ad Catacumbas, in H.T.S., 16 (1923), pp. 147-62. (36) Duchesne, L.: La Memoria Apostolorum della Via Appia, in Atti P.A., Vol. I, Part 1 (1923), pp. 1-22. (Found unfinished after the author's death.) (37) Erbes, K. : Die geschichtlichen Verhältnisse der Apostelgräber in Rom, in Zeitschr. f . Kirchengeschichte, 43 (1924), pp. 38-92. (38) Lanciani, R. : Wariderings in Ancient Roman Churches (1924), chapter 2. (39) Barnes, A. S. : A Lost Apostolic Sanctuary, in The Dublin Review, 175 (July, 1924), pp. 1-20. (40) *Kirsch, J. P.: Der stadtrömische christliche Festkalendar in Alterthum, Münster i. W. 1924.

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(41) *Leopold, H. M. R.: Over de opgravingen, etc. in Mededeel Nederlandsch Inst. (1924), pp. 77-118. (42) Styger, P.: Das Apostelmonumenl, etc. Rome, 1924. (43) Chéramy, H.: Saint Sebastian hors les murs, Paris, 1925, pp. 85. (Nos. 42 and 43 are popular summaries, illustrated.)

Nos. I l l , IV, V. Introduction. The ancient church now known by the name of San Sebastiano, at the third milestone of the Appian Way, has been for more than fifteen centuries associated in the minds of Roman Christians with the names of St. Peter and St. Paul. In the fourth century Pope Damasus (366-384), the first of Christian archaeologists, set up there an inscription which his successors in that field have found to be a riddle worthy of the Sphinx: " Here thou shouldst. know the saints beforetime dwelt, Whoe'er dost ask the names of Peter and of Paul. Frankly we grant the disciples the Orient sent, Christ by merit of blood they followed through the stars, Bound for the celestial haven, the realm of the devout: Rome had the better right her townsmen to defend: Thus, O new constellations, your praises Damasus tells." 1

Damasus' words in their obvious sense allude to a conflict of claims between the Roman Church and some other persons over the possession, literally or figuratively, of Peter and Paul. The rival claim is based upon the fact that the Apostles were Orientals, and it therefore must have been asserted by Orientals; Rome concedes it but declares her claim superior on the ground that by shedding their blood on Roman soil they had become Roman citizens. More, but not always consistent, details are supplied by the apocryphal acts of the fifth or sixth century (A.A.A., I, 118-222). The Martyrdom of Peter and Paul exists in a Greek (1) and a Latin (2) version, which differ slightly, while the Acts of Peter and Paul (3) exists in Greek only. The chief incidents related in (1) are as follows, with the variants of (2) and (3) added in brackets: Certain pious men from the regions of the East [2, Greeks; 3, Orientals] wished to snatch away (apwacraL) the relics (Xeii^ava) of the saints [2, took the bodies to carry them to the East; 3, lifted the bodies etc.]. A great earthquake [1, 2, 3] alarmed the citizens who ran and caught them [2 and 3 (add); at a place called " a d Catacumbas" at the third milestone]. The Romans put and kept the bodies three miles from the city one year and seven months 1

Hie habitasse prius sanctos eognosceie debes Nomina quisque Petri pariter Paulique requirió Discípulos oriens misit quod sponte fatemur Sanguinis ob meritum Christumque per astra secuti Aetherios petiere sinus regnaque piorum Roma suos potius meruit defendere cives Haec Damasus vestras referat nova sidera laudes. Translation of the first two lines by Archbishop Benson, Cyprian (1897), p. 484. Sidera, properly "constellations," but also in late Latin "stars" and perhaps so to be taken here.

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[2, the bodies were kept there one year and seven months (and so also 3, with) six (months for seven)], until they built the place where they could put them [(so also 3; 2, has,) where they had been put (fuerunt posita).] All assembled they put them in the place built for them [2; 3, thither the bodies were recalled and put, St. Peter's in the Vatican at the Naumachia, St. Paul's on the Ostian Way at the second milestone]. A fourth source is the Syriac martyrdom of Sharbil (Cureton, Antient Syriac Documents p. 61). The event is placed in the time of Pope Fabian (236-51). The excessive number of foreigners in Rome caused the Praetor to expel them; they demanded and received permission to take with them the bodies of their dead and began to remove the bodies of the two Apostles. The Romans objected but finally consented. An earthquake interrupted their sacriligious attempt and they relinquished it. There is no reference to the hiding-place ad Catacumbas. Gregory the Great (Epist. 30, Lib. IV. P. L. Tom. 77, col. 703) knows a similar tale, at the end of the sixth century. Christians from the Orient claimed the bodies as being those of their fellowcitizens and placed them ad Catacumbas. When they were about to remove them thence a thunderstorm so frightened them that they allowed the bodies to be placed "where they now are." 1 These traditions are in part confirmed by the ritual practice of the Roman Church. In the official list of the days and places appointed for the celebration of the burials of the bishops of Rome, a list which in its earliest form goes back to the early fourth century, the 29th of June is named as the day of Peter and Paul, the Vatican, the Ostian Way and ad Catacumbas as the places, and the date is added Tusco et Basso conss., i.e. A.D. 258, which is supposed to be the year of the burial ad Catacumbas. The oldest text connects Peter only with this spot, but the omission of Paul's name is quite certainly due to MS. corruption. The various attempts at reconciling the different texts will be found in the literature. Dr. Styger has proved (No. 10) that throughout the middle ages the Memoria Apostolorum was believed to be under the floor of the church. In the thirteenth century a rival tradition appeared which placed it in the so-called "Platonia," a large, partly subterranean chamber situated outside the apse of the church, and in the seventeenth century this later tradition completely displaced the older one. In 1893 an investigation conducted by Mgr. de Waal revealed the fact that about A.D. 400 a martyr named Quirinus had been buried in the Platonia, and he came to the conclusion that the Platonia had been constructed at that time and consequently could 1

All these sources will be found assembled in Dr. Styger's paper, No. 10.

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have had no connection with the burial of the Apostles 140 years earlier. A flood of new light has been thrown upon the problem by the excavations which have been made under the church of San Sebastiano during the last eleven years. In February 1915 Mgr. de Waal, on behalf of the Pontificia Commissione di Archaeologia Cristiana, entrusted the work of excavation to Dr. Paul Styger and Don Onorio Fasiolo, who conducted them with the constant assistance of Fra Damiano Pinna of the adjacent house of the Franciscan Friars, who has devoted much of his life to the study of the church which he serves. The results of this work will be found in Nos. 9, 10, 11 and 21. In 1916 the Italian Government took over the investigation. The late Prof. Francesco Fornari conducted it in 1916 and 1917; after his death it was resumed in 1919 by Prof. Gioacchino Mancini, who has published the results in No. 33. The excavations have revealed three building periods, the first extending from about A.D. 50 to 260, the second beginning soon after 260, the third, in which the church was erected, beginning prior to 356. On the site now occupied by the church there was originally a small ravine in the hillside at right angles to the Via Appia, the left margin of which, viewed from the road, was much lower than the right, so that the latter presented the appearance of a small cliff about thirty feet high. The position of this right margin is within and approximately parallel to the right wall of the church. About the middle of the first century a row of columbaria was built along the top of the cliff (Fig. 2, 1-8); fifty years or so later three large tombs (Fig. 3) were cut in the rock walls at the foot of the cliff (Fig. 2, E, CD, B), each with chambers on two levels connected by stairs and decorated in the best style of the period with fresco paintings and reliefs in plaster. Near the tombs and also outside the apse of the church were some buildings of the second century, also adorned with frescoes. The tombs were designed originally for the reception of the ashes of the dead, but, during the second century, both they and the columbaria were adapted to inhumation. In the face of the cliff, to the right of the tomb marked E, were several loculi of which two were certainly the graves of Christians. One bore the anchor and the cross; the other was inscribed: 'Evda.5' airoKtLTai Qtovbr), rah evaefiris, ttpaeia, atfivri, Kai na\fi tror] TT &IJ.O.. "Here is laid away Theonoe, a religious girl, gentle, demure, and pretty and clever too." The word air6/cetrat, deposita est, is a peculiarly Christian term (see p. 307) and the adjectives also are strongly suggestive of Christianity. These burials are probably of the third century. It is known that close by, probably across the road, there was in the second and third centuries a post of the Peregrini or "Foreign

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Legion," also known as Frumentarii, a corps which served as the Emperor's personal agents or secret police, stationed here, no doubt, to keep an eye on the foreigners travelling to and from the city along the Appian Way and on the Jews and other Orientals settled in the neighborhood.1 About the middle of the third century the entire site came into Christian hands and was completely transformed at considerable expense. Since the spot was situated directly under the windows of the secret police, the work must have been carried on with the

FIGURE 3.

F A Ç A D E O F T O M B S ON F I R S T L E V E L , B E F O R E C L E A R A N C E O F A R E A .

(Mancini, op. cit., Tav. IX)

full knowledge and consent of the Government, probably not long after Gallienus restored to the Christians their churches and cemeteries in 261 (Euseb. Hist., VII, 13), and perhaps through the influence of his wife, who is supposed to have been a Christian (Benson, Cyprian, pp. 300, 304). The ravine was filled with earth, effectually burying the tombs and the greater part of the buildings. A court (indicated by Mancini in Fig. 2 by the letter E which I have used for the tomb beneath it) was laid out over the tombs; it was of irregular trapezoidal shape, partly paved with large tiles (Fig. 4) and provided with a roof supported by the columns i and I. According to Styger's description (No. 21, pp. 93-4) the niche, marked / in fig. 2, apparently intended for a statue, was in one wall of the court, but Mancini's plan seems to put it outside. Between the 1 The post is known from inscriptions, C.I.L., VI, 230, 3329. See also Ruggiero, Diet. Epigrafico, III, p. 222 s.v. Frumentarius, and R. Cagnat in Daremberg and Saglio, Diet. d. Ant., s.v. Peregrini and Frumentarius.

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court and the road, on a level about four feet higher than the court, was erected a species of loggia (Figs. 5, 6, 7) with its back toward the road and the opposite side open toward the court. The rear wall was plastered and adorned with frescoes. This building has been named by Styger the "triclia." About 200 invocations to Peter

FIGURE 4 .

COURT ON SECOND L E V E L ( M a n c i n i , op.

cit.,

fig.

15)

and Paul found scratched on the plaster, with allusions to the refrigeria or funerary feasts there celebrated, prove that this was for many years a place where Christians met to commemorate the Apostles.

FIGTJEE 5 .

TRICLIA BECONSTRUCTED

(.Styger, R. Q. S.

1915,

p.

155)

Funerary feasts were a survival of paganism, and, as they were frequently the occasion of drunkenness and other scandals, the Church tried during the fourth century to suppress them (see Nos. 12 and 26). Probably in pursuit of this policy, the triclia and court

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were destroyed, the site was again filled m with earth and a church erected over it in honor of the Apostles Peter and Paul, which at a later date was dedicated to St. Sebastian. Dr. Styger discovered that from the fourth to the seventh centuries the entire area beneath the pavement of the church had been used as a cemetery. The tombs were crowded closely together, sometimes placed one above the other, and many tombs had been used for more than one interment. In the nave alone, of which about three fourths has been excavated, more than 200 tombs were found. The covering slab of one which was still intact bore the date 356 (or 357), and, since it was still in its original position as one of the paving slabs of the floor, the church must have been built still earlier. The church and the tombs constitute the third and latest building level.

FIGITKB 6 .

B E A R W A L L OF T B I C L I A

(Styger, op. cit., Tav. Ill)

The second level, that of the court and triclia, was found by Styger at depths varying from about six to about ten feet beneath the pavement of the church. The graffiti of the triclia proved that for many years before the building of the church an intimate association between this spot and the memory of the apostles Peter and Paul had existed in the minds of the Christians of Rome. The area in front of the rock-cut tombs on the first level was discovered by Mancini about 22 feet beneath the court, about 30 feet beneath the church. The lowest chamber of the tombs lay about 14 feet deeper. Epitaphs found on this level proved that for many years, probably for the better part of a century, perhaps longer, Christians had owned these tombs, or at least some of them, and had there buried their dead. Yet no evidence whatever was discovered indicating an association between this spot and Peter and Paul.

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The significance of this fact should be well considered. The few square yards of area afforded by the triclia wall was literally covered with invocations of the Apostles, jammed together and often written one over another; the scanty fragments of plaster recovered yielded more than 200 such inscriptions. Yet the broad expanse of plastered walls in the spacious tombs beneath bore not so much as one. The ''argument from silence" very seldom possesses any significance and I am reluctant to use it. But in this case it is forced upon one. How can the facts be explained except upon the assumption that between the periods represented by the first and the second levels something had happened which established an association between the place called ad Catacumbas and the Apostles Peter and Paul, an association which had not existed before? And what

FIGÜRE 7.

TKICLIA, LOOKING TOWARDS COURT

Tav. II)

(Styger, op. cil.,

plausible reason can now be alleged for denying that the event in question was that described by early tradition and confirmed by the weighty testimony of Damasus, a man by no means disposed to accept tradition without question, namely the translation to that spot for a short time of the relics believed by the Roman Church to be those of Peter and Paul? Upon this conclusion the majority of archaeologists who have studied the question seem to be agreed, although many differences of opinion still exist as to when and why the bodies were taken there. Those that still refuse to be convinced by the new evidence strive to put upon it some other than the obvious interpretation, and maintain that they "are entitled at least to the benefit of the doubt." But upon one point there is very general consent; the majority of the Catholic Right will accept, not less confidently than the Modernist Left, the dictum concisely stated by one of our most competent

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scholars: " T h e legend of the oriental thieves is out of the question." And in that dictum I also would have concurred at any time since I first began to study this question, now some eighteen years ago, until I happened upon and translated the three following Aramaic inscriptions. In the débris filling one of the rooms (Fig. 2 C) of the Roman structure built over Tomb CD, Mancini found a terracotta group (Fig. 8) measuring 12 cm. in height and 8 cm. in width, bearing upon the back the maker's stamp LVCI. 1 Inscriptions had been scratched on both front and back in Latin letters, cursive and capital. That on the back (Fig. 9) reads:

FIGURE 8.

TERRACOTTA G R O U P

Ego coacta Pecoris Peculi Iuli Eufrates et Maniliae Bictorias hos ego ubicumque deposuii

(Mancini, op. cit., fig.

12J

"Under compulsion, I, Pecoris, [slave-girl] of Peculium, [son] of Julius Euphrates and Manilia Victoria, them I have laid away anywhere."

Notes: That "Peculi" is the name of the child may be inferred from the fact that "Peculio" is written on the breast of the female figure to the right of that of the 1 Two other objects of the same make are known, a lamp (C.I.L., XV, No. 6.526) and a small group representing two comic actors (C.I.L., XV, No. 6143; Benndorf and Schoene, Antike Bildwerhe d. Lateran. Mus., p. 404, No. 662), but neither seems to have been published.

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child. The nominative might be "Peculitis" or "Peculium," but the latter, "Little Treasure" would be a suitable pet name for a child,—a suggestion which I owe to my friend Prof. R. G. Kent. To him also I owe the translation above adopted which implies that Pecoris was in some special sense the child's slave, probably his nurse. "Bictorias": A Greek genitive of a Latin word in apposition with a Latin word in the Latin genitive is surprising, but the last letter is identical in form with Pecoris' other s's and does not resemble her e's. "deposuii," could be read "deposue," but the double i is probably used here, as in her Aramaic inscription, to indicate the long vowel.

Commentary: One may gather from Pecoris' language that she feels the burial she has given her master, mistress and their child had not been what she would have wished it to be. She has laid them away "anywhere," i.e. anywhere she could, not in a suitable tomb, and she has done so "under compulsion" of circumstances.

(I

FIGURE 9 .

CO

Ml C O A / f I

LATIN INSCRIPTION ON BACK OP GROUP ( M a n c i n i , op.

tit.,

fig.

14)

Mancini describes (No. 33, p. 47) an obviously hasty and unauthorized burial which had been made within a few yards of the spot where Pecoris' inscription was found, but he does not connect it with the burial of which Pecoris speaks. On the cement-covered area in front of the three rock cut tombs he found alcuni scheletri, but he specifically mentions two only, lying side by side with their heads towards the east. Upon these bodies earth had been heaped to a height of about five feet, completely blocking the entrances of Tombs E and CD. The owners of the tombs, strange to say, respected these illegal interments and, in order to restore access to their own property, built two short stairs leading from the new to the old level. In Figure 7, part of the earth-filling still remains in place and one can see the position of the new stair leading down to the threshold of the midmost tomb, CD. 1 In constructing the stair into Tomb E bricks were used of the 1 The letters E, CD, B in Figure 2 are used by Mancini to designate the court and some rooms of the Roman building, to which I need not refer. The tombs, which he terms respectively X, Y and Z, are outlined in the plan (Fig. 2) by faint dotted lines.

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reign of Hadrian. Again, the building of the stair shows that the owners of the two tombs expected them to continue in use for some time. I shall show later (p. 321) that Tomb E was probably filled and no longer used about the year 200, while Tomb CD remained in use until the middle of the third century. The probable date of the interments is then the second half of the second century. The lettering of Pecoris' inscription contains a mixture of early and late forms which gives no definite indication of date. The word deposui, however, is of significance. It was used of burial by Christians only and did not become customary upon epitaphs in Rome until after the middle of the third century (see Le Clercq's article in D.A.C.L., IV, 668-73). But the idea must have been current and

w N fj vv rr I m i / nT \ x r i i rc o O M i i N C ^ a N o r c M S T / i r N i i

FIGURE

10.

ARAMAIC I N S C R I P T I O N ON F R O N T OF G R O U P

VP

(Mancini, op. cit.,fig.13)

the term generally intelligible long before it came into funerary usage. Tertullian, for example, says (de resurr. carnis, 27; II, p. 502 Oehler): ''' My people, enter ye into the larders (ceUas promos) for a little until my anger passes away' (Isaiah, 26, 20). The 'larders' would be the sepulchres in which they will have to rest awhile. . . . Why did he use the word 'larders' . . . if not because meat is kept in larders salted and laid away for use (reposita), thence to be withdrawn in due time? For our bodies likewise are treated with spices (condimentis) and put away (sequestrantur) for burial in mausolea and in graves, thence to issue forth when the Lord commands."

It would have been possible for Pecoris to use the word in a semi-private expression of grief long before it came into formal usage. Pecoris' inscription, then, may also belong to the latter half of the second century, and there is no chronological difficulty in supposing that she is referring to the interments which Mancini found. It remains to be ascertained, however, whether the two skeletons

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were those of a man and a woman, and whether the phrase " s o m e skeletons" includes other bones which might have been those of the child Peculium,—points upon which Mancini gives no information. No. III. T h e inscription on the front of the group (Fig. 10), also written b y Pecoris in Latin letters, is the third of the Aramaic inscriptions which I am discussing. T h e text runs as follows: comodoisti nonqumbe pvinter S

pecvlio

illentirteconsvf niiincognoscvntficnii evirates ivlivs maniliabictoria

lo

T h e word " P e c u l i o " does not belong to the inscription proper; it is written close to the figure of the child and is intended to signify that the child's image in the group is dedicated to (or is a portrait of ?) the dead child Peculium. T h e remainder is Aramaic and should be divided into words as follows: como do-istinon qum kemo de-istenon komu bepu i n t e r S illen befuh, yinter SLemo] illen tirtecon suf niiin

cognoscunt

tartehon sof nihln

cognoscunt

I'J*

CUE]?' pri'j

tii^BiH

..ID?

IB}?

IHD?

t|iD ti}

fic nii lo pik nih Ion eufrates Euphrates

1C|J

Jin'pvi ri':

p'»B

iulius Julius

manilia bictoria Manilia Victoria " W h e n they were changed, they arose; in the wind the N a m e will guard them; both of them finally know comforts; departed, at rest are Euphrates Julius, Manilia Victoria." Notes on the text: Kamez is pronounced as o (see p. 290). S6wa mobile is written £in "bepu "; in " c o - " it takes its color from the following vowel, like the "snatched" vowels of Hebrew; in " do-'' and '' -ti-'' its quality is that of the preceding vowel. Daghesh forte is recognized in its single occurrence, "illen"; daghesh lene is recognized in case of p and/only, "bepu," "suf," "fic," but not in accord with traditional rules.

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como do-: kemo or kemo di- are the regular words for " w h e n " in Samaritan, kad in Judaean. For example in Genesis and Exodus the Hebrew kaaser occurs in the sense of " w h e n " 16 times, for which in every instance Onkelos has kad, " J o n a t h a n " has kad 11 times and kemo de- only twice, but the Samaritan Targum has kemo or kemo de- 13 times and kad only thrice. istinon: istenon is regular Galilaean, the Judaean would be istinl'u, but the Galilaean form also occurs in the Targums (Dalman, pp. 338, 344). Petermann does not quote this form for the Samaritan perfect. qum: The first letter was first written as c and then changed to q, probably because it is followed by u and the sequence qu was familiar in Latin. So in No. V one has " u q u " for uca. That it is not intended to suggest the peculiar guttural quality of Koph is shown by "fic," where Koph is written with a c. The dropping of the Pe 'al pf. 3. pi. m. ending -u occurs (with modification of the preceding vowel to -u-) in the Babylonian dialect (Levias §§231, 246d, 486c, e.g. lfum, zul for kamu, zalu) but is not recognized by tradition for Palestinian. Dalman, however, holds that, while it was pronounced in Galilaean, it was dropped in Judaean (pp. 95, 255). inter: For yinter. The y merges into the vowel, a pronunciation recognized by tradition in Syriac and in some words of Palestinian Aramaic. So Jerome transcribes yi- and ye- as i- (Dalman, p. 63). Galilaean would have yittar, but in Judaean r does not change a preceding vowel to a, nor is n always assimilated (Dalman, p. 291). S: The large S between the lines must be an abbreviation for the subject of "inter." Among the words represented by the initial s in later times is slmo (Handler-Kahan, Lexicon der Abbreviaturen, 1922, s.l.), " T h e Name," which here yields excellent sense. tirtecon: is triply irregular: (1) "tir-" is closer to the Samaritan ter- than to the Judaean tar-. (2) "-con" for -hon, probably because the Latin h was ne longer pronounced in the second century except in mihi and nihil (cf. tho mediaeval michi and nichil). (3) The numeral is feminine but the suffix masculine; it ought to be tarwehon. For this there is no authority, but a parallel occurs in the Targum to Ruth, 1, 19 we'azelon tarwehen " and they two (Naomi andRuth) went," in which a masculine stem-form has a feminine suffix. In the later forms of the Palestinian dialect, however, a form of " t w o " is found which is spelled TRTY (tarte, tirte, terte ?) and is used both with masculine and with feminine nouns (Dalman, p. 129, 6), although no example is given of its use with a masculine suffix. In view of this evidence for confusion between the masculine and feminine forms of "two," I have allowed tarte- to stand, instead of larve-. as the representative of tradition. suf: is used as an adverb in late Palestinian (Dalman, p. 213, 4). niiin: The first two i's probably represent the long vowel. I do not know another example of this word in the plural. fic: must be the Pe 'al passive participle of puk, an alternative form of n$fa%, which is known in late Hebrew but not in Aramaic, nii: Pe. pass. pt. of nuh; cf. "niiin." lo: The I- is the "dative of agent" in the passive construction, commoninall forms of Aramaic. One may take lo as the bare preposition 16- (cf. d6- for dSabove) and construe it with "eufrates." I have followed Prof. Montgomery in regarding it as a shortened form of Uhon, Ion, like the Babylonian lehu, which sometimes occurs in Palestinian Aramaic (Dalman, p. 203). The dialect is Palestinian, and the use of " como do-" for " w h e n " a n d of "tirte-" for tarte-, suggest Samaritan, but are not conclusive.

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Commentary: The four sentences in the inscription relate four steps in the future life of the spirits of the deceased. As soon as they were " c h a n g e d " by death from the material to the spiritual mode of being they " a r o s e " and ascended from earth into the " w i n d " or upper air. As they pass through it " t h e N a m e " protects them from the dangers which they there encounter, and "finally" their journey ends in heaven where they " k n o w " or perceive, become conscious of, the " c o m f o r t s " joys and satisfactions of the heavenly life. Thenceforward they have " d e p a r t e d " forever from earth and its troubles and are forever " a t r e s t " in the peace and happiness of heaven. The belief t h a t the spirit after death ascends to the celestial regions is probably of eastern origin. It appeared in Greece about the middle of the fifth century before Christ and spread rapidly. In the first century of our era it was very generally accepted, not only by Jews and the Hellenistic peoples but also in the highest circles at Rome. The experiences of the spirit in course of its ascent were variously imagined in accordance with various conceptions as to the structure and inhabitants of the "meteorological" region below the moon and of the celestial region above it, but all these theories taught of dangers to be encountered and of punishments or purifications to be endured. Such ideas must have been brought into the Christian Church in the minds of the very first Gentile converts. Indeed, even St. Paul himself declares that the material body must be " c h a n g e d " before it can "inherit immortality" (1 Cor. 15, 50-52), speaks of Christians meeting the Lord "in the a i r " (1 Thess. 4, 17), and knows a "ruler of the realm of the a i r " (Eph. 2, 2), "rulers of this world" (1 Cor. 2, 6), "world-rulers of this darkness," "spirits of wickedness in the celestial regions," against whom the Christian must battle even in this life (Eph. 5, 12). A numerous and influential branch of the early Christian Church rejected the apostolic tradition, and sought to graft the new religion upon the Hellenistic rather than the Jewish stem. They are well known as "Gnostics," and by them these ideas were elaborated into details not relevant to the present problem. But some of these theories were also widely accepted among the orthodox; Damasus himself (p. 295) describes Peter and Paul as "following Christ through the s t a r s " and as themselves shining as "new constellations" in the skies. Perhaps to Damasus this was merely poetic metaphor, but to many who read his lines it certainly was much more. Among the attractions which drew Christians to the Gnostics was the assurance that the Name of Christ, taken in baptism, would prove a charm efficacious to repel the evil spirits which assault the

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311

spirit during its passage through the " L e f t " (the region between earth and moon, filled with water, air and fire), and to guarantee it acquittal when it appeared before the terrible Judge whose seat was in the " H e b d o m a d " (the realm of the seven planetary Rulers of this world). A few quotations will illustrate these ideas: Hermas, The Sheperd, Sim. 9, 16, 3: "Before a man bears the Nameof theSon of God he is dead. But when he receives the seal he puts away mortality and receives life. The seal then is the water." Clem. Alex., Excerpta ex Theodoto, 86: "Of the coin brought to him the Lord said, not 'whose property is it?' but, 'Whose is the image and the superscription' (Mk. 12, 13; Ml. 22, 15; L. 20, 20). Caesar's, in order that it might be given to him to whom it belonged. So also the believer: through Christ he has the superscription, the Name of God, and the Spirit as the image. Even the irrational animals show by a seal to whom each belongs and by the seal it is claimed, so also the believing soul after receiving the seal of the Truth bears about 'the brandmarks of Christ' (Gal. 6, 7)." Ib. 80: "For when sealed by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit he cannot be seized by any other power, and by three Names is set free from the trinity in corruption" (i.e. earth, water and air) "having borne the image of the earthly, then he will bear the image of the heavenly' (1 Cor. 15, 14)." Ib. 22 (Theodotus) . . . " t h a t we also, possessing the Name, may not be caught and be prevented from entering the Pleroma by the Boundary and the Cross."

The best parallel to Pecoris' inscription is supplied by the dying prayer of the Apostle in the Greek Acts of Philip the Apostle (A.A.A., II, 2, p. 85; not in the Syriac Acts). It exhibits a curious mixture of Hellenistic and orthodox ideas which may be original, but is more probably due to orthodox revision. " Come now Jesus and give me the eternal crown of victory over every hostile power and authority, and let not their murky air enwrap m e " (Pecoris: 'In the wind the Name will guard them') " t h a t I may pass through the waters of fire" (read, " t h e waters and the fire") "and all the abyss" (the Left). "Lord Jesus Christ, let not the Enemy find room to accuse me before thy judgment seat" (orthodox emendation for " t h e judgment seat of the Demiurge") "but clothe me with thy glorious robe, thy luminous seal which ever shines" (The Name) "until I shall pass by all the World-Rulers'' (the seven planetary spirits) "and the wicked Snake our antagonist" (who is coiled about the world, his tail in his mouth). "Now therefore Lord Jesus make me to meet thee in the air" (from St. Paul; incompatible with the preceding scheme) "granting me the requital wherewith I have requited my enemies, and transform the form of my body into angelic glory " (Pecoris: "When they were changed") "and make me to rest in thy blessedness" (Pecoris: "Finally they know comforts; departed, at rest") "and I shall receive from thee the promise thou didst promise thy saints for ever. Amen."

Pecoris' inscription, then, expresses ideas which we know been current in her age. But her allusions to her beliefs few to justify calling her a Gnostic. Her opening words, they were changed, they arose," show that she did not spirits remain in limbo until the day of resurrection; she

to have are too "When believe thought

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they ascended to heaven immediately after death. 1 But this would not exclude belief in an ultimate resurrection of the body, and her use of the word deposui would seem to imply it. And this was a doctrine which the Gnostics generally rejected without qualification. No. IV. The fourth inscription (Fig. 11) is found on a loculus in Tomb CD, the midmost of the three tombs. The inscription proper reads: IIATAA ET HAN0IA2 Paula et Xanthias KTEI AAAOTAAS MATPEI 2TE $HKHPTN[T] qui dadoudas matri suae fecerunt Mancini, followed by Marucchi (No. 33, pp. 70; 99, n. 1), supposes Paula and Xanthias to be two sisters and reads qu(a)e Idadoudas (Marucchi, Jadud-a), and in my first attempts to interpret the inscription I also followed him. But Professor Kent advises me that Xanthias is used as a masculine name only, and I have been unable

FIGURE 11.

L A T I N AND ARAMAIC E P I T A P H IN T O M B

GD (Mancini, op. cil., fig. 24)

to find any authority for taking it as feminine. It would then be necessary to read qui, which, by analogy with matrei, must be spelled quel, leaving as the foreign name Dadoudas. A number of Hebrew and Aramaic names are known which would resemble Dadoudas in transcription, and the interpreters usually regard the first syllable as equivalent to the Hebrew and Aramaic dôd, dâd, "Beloved." For example: Heb. dôdâvâhû " J a h v e ist F r e u n d " (Gesenius). Late Heb. dôdnî'ël (M. Schwab, Vocabulaire de l'angelologie in Mém. d. I. Acad. d. Inscr. I Sér. T. X. 2e. Part, p. 100) " a m i de D i e u " (but, ibid., DDY'L, Dadë El, "seins de Dieu"). Palmyrene, D D ' (Legrain, Diet. d. noms propres palmyréens, 1886, s.v.) Douda, "loué." Babylonian Aramaic on a "Chaldaeo-Persian " seal DD'LH, which de Vogue renders, "Summo Deo dilectus" (C.I.S., No. 107). Syriac, Dâdlso' or Dâdyêsû' which is interpreted by Barhebraeus (Payne-Smith, Thes. Syr. s.v.) "Beloved of Jesus." 1 Compare an inscription of the third century (D.A.C.L., III, 2452; VII, 642) 'IouAtias Kvapk(rras Trjs deo(j>i\€trT&Ti]s rj tràp£ èvdàôe tceÏTai i/'UX7? 5ai avaKaivriadtiaa rà TTv [eu^ar] i X[P«TTO] D Kat àyyeXucàv oùua \a.Bo voa h obpaviov X[pitrro] u tiaaiKdav fierà TÎÛV àytlaiv àve[\]iifj^>0Tj.

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313

Analogy, then, would suggest t h a t Dadoudas means "Beloved of O u d a " or "of Oudas." But I can discover no Aramaic name or noun which ouda or oudas could plausibly be supposed to represent. The syllable da- could, however, represent the genitive particle, in which case da-douda-s would be an Aramaic paraphrase of the familiar phrase of the Song of Songs " I am m y Beloved's" (am ledodi, 7, 11; cf. also 2, 16 and 6, 3), and would mean, " O n e who belongs to the Beloved." If this be the meaning, it is more t h a n probable t h a t Xanthias, and presumably his mother and sister also, were Christians. Before the general adoption of the custom of infant baptism, converts frequently took at baptism a new name of distinctively Christian import such as Renatus, Renobatus, Redemptus, Reparatus, Benedictus, Cyriacus, Quiriacus, Anastasius, Quadragesima, Dominica, Deogratias, Servusdei, Fides, Spes, Charitas, Sophia (D.A.C.L., VII, 744-5). The word " B e l o v e d " is used only once in the New Testament as a name of Christ (Eph. 1, 6), b u t is very common in the later literature (e.g. Ascension of Isaiah, The Shepherd of Hermas). The idea t h a t Christians belong to Christ as slaves to a master is so frequently reiterated and developed in Christian thought from St. Paul onwards t h a t it scarcely needs illustration; if it does the passages quoted on p. 311 will supply it. The inference t h a t this is a Christian grave is confirmed, conclusively I think, b y two other inscriptions found within a few feet of it. I n the adjacent chamber, traced on the wall while the plaster was still fresh, is the Christian symbol ITX6T2, a combination of IxQvs with the T-shaped cross, and upon a loculus in the short passage-way connecting the two chambers are the words EN0A KEITAI IIAP9EN02 (No. 33, pp. 69-70), which could scarcely be other t h a n Christian. On the upper left corner of the loculus which bears the inscription of Paula and Xanthias is a large ivy leaf and an inscription of three short lines written in Greek letters but in the Aramaic language. For the first line I trust to Mancini's transcription, as it is not legible in the reproduction. The fourth letter of the second line, which could be either E or 2, I take as E, Mancini as 2. MAN T I 2 TOTE IIAP Ni22

man tistewe parnus

' 1 Mf'n f? OtJ-W

One would expect a relative after the indefinite antecedent man, i.e. man de-. I have, however, seen the same omission in Syriac (unless it be a mere textual blunder) in the Epistle of Mara bar Serapion (Cureton, Spicilegium Syriacum, pp. 43-4, Syr.): aik deman lazban zeur, " a s one [who exists] for a short time." The verb tistewe is Ithpe'al imperfect, and must be either 3. s. f.

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or 2. s. m. The latter is not possible with man preceding; the subject referred to by man must be the anonymous mother of Paula and Xanthias. The verb séwá, sewi means " t o be like," hence " t o be equal," "level," " o n a par with," " w o r t h y , " with various derived senses. The Ithpe'al, in Syriac, means " to be like, equal, worthy," etc., but in Aramaic is recognized by Jastrow only in derived senses and as equivalent to Ithpa'al. If, however, it be taken as meaning " O n e [who] will b e " or "would b e " or, simply, as the generalized imperfect, " i s , " " w o r t h y , " the phrase yields good and eminently appropriate sense, for it is the precise equivalent of the benemerenti which was for centuries a term of frequent occurrence on epitaphs. Parnüs or pirnüs properly means "food," "nourishment," but it also is a suitable translation of a funerary formula, namely, the Christian term refrigerium, which, although it is supposed to refer, when occurring on epitaphs, to the refreshment of heaven, was associated in the popular mind with feasting. In the graffiti of the triclia it is the regular term for the funerary feasts there celebrated in honor of Peter and Paul, e.g. Petro et Paulo Tomius Coelius Refrigerium feci. Father Grossi Gondi, S. J., who has published two thorough studies of the subject (Nos. 12 and 26), shows that, although the word does not occur in inscriptions of earlier date than these, it is found in Christian literature as early as 200 and is an exclusively Christian term. It therefore still further confirms the inference that Paula and Xanthias were Christians. Brief as the inscription of Paula and Xanthias is and unimportant as regards its content, its significance is by no means inconsiderable, for it proves that one element in the "legend of the oriental thieves" is a historical fact. At least one oriental family possessed the right of burial in the midmost tomb ad Catacumbas, therefore had access to that tomb and could have concealed stolen property there, which the legend represents the tomb-robbers as doing. In the second place, there remains no good reason for doubting that Damasus is alluding to a story similar to that told in the fifth century Martyrdoms. In the third place, since, when Damasus wrote, the tombs of the Orientals had been buried out of sight for about one hundred years, and for two hundred or more when the legend was recorded in the Martyrdoms, this fact must have been handed down by written or oral tradition; if so, some of the other elements associated with it in the story may have been handed down in like manner, and the whole legend, although not established as fact, acquires a measure of respectability, a claim to consideration, which it has not hitherto possessed. 1 1 The acute intelligence of Prof. Marucchi has already divined, from the single word which he read as Jaduda, the conclusions which I have above reached.

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315

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No. V. If I have devoted much time and space to the traditions connected with San Sebastiano and to the contributions of other students towards their elucidation, it has been with a view to the understanding of No. V and a proper appreciation of its significance, an appreciation which the somewhat sensational interest attaching to it will, I fear, tend to exaggerate. In excavating the triclia, Dr. Styger found, scratched upon a fragment of plaster which can be seen in Figure 6 adhering to the upper part of the buttress-like mass of brick on the left, an inscription of three complete lines with portions of three others, written in Latin letters. Attempts at translating it have been made by several scholars (see Nos. 9, 10, 15, 17, 21), all proceeding upon the assumption that the language is Latin, but no one has succeeded in making satisfactory sense. In several cases readings of the text have been adopted which it would be difficult to justify upon any other ground than that these alone make sense, a plea which would be legitimate only if the language were Latin. Figure 12 gives the inscription itself, taken from the excellent reproduction published by Marucchi in No. 17, Tav. IV; in Figure 13 the lines which I suppose to be those of the graver's tool are traced over in ink in order to make them more clearly visible. Every effort has been made to render faithfully the objective evidence; in only one case (the last letter of "ore") have I been consciously influenced by the desire to make sense. In my interpretation of the evidence, the skill in "reading" photographs which my friend Prof. George Rowley, of the department of art and archaeology of Princeton University, acquired as an officer of artillery in France has been of great assistance to me. The text runs as follows: licv u v isiiae de sicvincosvmalv servvdeietuictoorein deteriore loc overbine navigeivlv 1 uratr onis uqu ci Dividing the words and adding the traditional pronunciation: lieu

»3'tf n

ha]llku

uvisi i a e de sicvin cosu woesïyâhê

dë-sikbïn

kôsû

•id?

pa?»!

'nv??'

NEW BOLD: FIVE

TRANSLITERATED

ma lu seru ma 'lü

ntf

ic

iid'eyetü

to

ore

yikketü

loco

lul lül

av i geiv

ur atro hör

'atro

in deteriore loco

TRICLIA INSCRIPTION WITH T E X T

EMPHASIZED

'

ge v

nis

»on«

Tin

enTs

ci uqu kl

3TIM

ühreb

FIGURE 13.

havvl

niri

höre

in deteriore loco u erb in deteriore

in en

opp

seru

udeietu

'innen

317

INSCRIPTIONS

-IPP

'ökü

" w]ent and the pits which hid the bodies they desecrated, broke open, and what they brought away they usedto-keep behind, in an inferior burial-place- and a desolate. Those [things] a man pointed out within a staircase of a cave of the burial-place when they were in distress." Notes on the text: lieu: Of the I nothing remains but the tip, and that may be a mere fracture of the plaster. The i of the second syllable is recognized by Jastrow in both Pe 'al and Pa 'el; cf. Ex. 15, 20 Merx, tiaKkü.

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uvisiiae: Notwithstanding the f r a g m e n t a r y condition of the letters there is little uncertainty as to the reconstruction, which is confirmed by t h e excellent sense which t h e word makes with t h e context. While restoring it I h a d no idea what the meaning of the word would be. The traditional pointing of the noun varies between slah, seyah (with one or two Yuds), and siyyah, t h e difference in pronunciation being very slight. The preposition "-v-" is required by t h e verb "malu." de: For t h e form of t h e D cf. C.I.L., IV, T a b . XVI, 11 (Pompeii) where a similar D occurs with the lower stroke separated from t h e remainder of the letter. cosu: The o probably represents Kamez; cf. Levias (§531e) "Some verbs (Lamed Yud, etc.) in the Qal and in the Ithpg 'el have Kamez after t h e first stem consonant instead of sSwa, a phenomenon we have met also in the strong verb. We might call it a Hebraism. T o what extent a n d with what consistency such usage prevailed it is difficult to tell." I t may, however, represent sgwa, as in No. I l l , " c o m o d o " . The P e 'al pf. 3. m. pi. ending of Lamed Y u d verbs -u is Babylonian (Levias, p. 139); Palestinian would have -o. B u t in view of the erratic interchange of u a n d o in all these inscriptions, the two verbs, "cosu," a n d " s e r u " cannot be regarded as determining the question of dialect. malu: T h e usual form would be ma '&lu, b u t t h e Yemenite pointing would have ma 'lu (Dalman p. 93, / ) , here taken as representing tradition. The verb requires bS-, i.e. -"vi -siiae." udeietu: The relative sometimes occurs without antecedent (Dalman, p. 117, 2. cf. Gen. 34, 13, O; 41, 55, O, J I ; 1 Sam. 10, 16; Jer. 12, 13). For 'eyetu instead of 'aiyHu see Dalman, pp. 91e; 355. The ending varies between -tun, -tlw, -ti'u, -tu (Dalman, p. 358; Levias, §609). icto: For the pronunciation of yi- as i-, see note on No. I l l , " i n t e r " ; for the final o instead of u, see note on No. I, "siivoso." T h e word is Pe. imp. 3. m. pi. of nlkat, yinlcgtu, with the n assimilated to t h e following letter. T h e failure to mark the doubling of the If is not surprising, since this writer ignores it in the two other words in which it should be indicated, "inen" a n d "avi," b u t one would expect t o find i t expressed by vocalic sSwa, icetd. This omission betrays a difference in pronunciation for which tradition offers no parallel. ore: A small o of precisely this form will be found in H. B. Van Hoesen, Roman Cvrsive Writing, Princeton Univerity Press, 1915, Table 2, col. 18, P a p y rus No. 11, of 130 A.D. The last letter is either e or i. T h e vertical stroke is clear; above to the right is a light rectangular line on t h e surface which looks like a superficial scratch, b u t it has not cut deep enough to form a furrow which could cast a shadow. If this is t h e m a r k of a tool t h e letter would be a n e, if not, ani. deteriore: The first letter could be u, which also would be intelligible, b u t I think d more probable; see notes on translation. uerb: The letters " e r " are uncertain. Examination of other letters shows t h a t t h e tool has frequently gouged out the adjacent plaster, e.g. in de, dete, nav, lvZ. Assuming t h a t the v- shaped hole has been made in the same way, one m a y take t h e right edge of each a r m as marking the p a t h of the tool, exerting pressure t o t h e left. This gives letters which m a y be read as er. R's of this form will be found C.I.L., IV, Tab. 16, No. 5; T a b . 20, No. 11. For t h e transposition of r a n d e see note on I, "aaria." inen avi: Failure to double t h e n a n d t h e v m a y be due to t h e fact t h a t in Hebrew script it was not customary, before t h e invention of t h e daghesh forte point, to indicate the doubling of a letter. ur: The first letter is probably u b u t might be o. Van Hoesen gives a few examples of a n open-topped o with the left side tending toward a n angle (Table I, col. 7 and 8, Pap. No. 3, age of Augustus; T. 2, col. 17, Pap. No. 10, A.D. 129;

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T. 3, col. 14, Pap. No. 38, late 2nd cent.), but u's of this type are more frequent and resemble our letter more closely (Table B, inscriptions on lead, about the beginning of our era; T. D, Dacian wax tablets, 2nd cent.; T. 2, col. 4, 5, Pap. No. 7, A.D. 96, and others down to the 4th century, e.g. T. 4, col. 7, Pap. 49, A.D. 310). atro: The character which I read tr is read by Styger, Grossi Gondi, Celi, Silvagni, and Marucchi (No. 10, p. 193 n. 2) as ti, which, indeed, if the language be Latin, is inevitable, seeing that it is followed by onis. But this reading ignores the uppermost element of the group, which in the reproduction is indistinguishable from the other gashes made by the writer's tool. Admitting this element the group cannot be read except as a monogram of two letters. Such monograms are not uncommon in the Pompeian graffiti (e.g. the De of I "dec" and C.I.L., IV, Tab. I; Van Hoesen, Table A, foot, and pp. 21-22). Although no other example occurs in this inscription, one is found in the VN of "cognoscunt" No. I l l , fig. 10, in addition to that of No. I. The right-hand component is the usual right component of a capital R; the left is approximately a right angle above which is a light horizontal stroke which was cut before the R element was added. That this is a t becomes obvious upon comparing it with the f's of "icto" and "deteriore." See also C.I.L., IV, No. 1313, Tab. 27, No. 4, where the right angle without the cross stroke serves as a t, and Van Hoesen, T. 3, col. 14, Pap. 23, A.D. 178; T. 2, col. 21, Pap. 10, A.D. 129; T. 4, col. 21, Pap. 56, ca. A.D. 340. The short vertical stroke of the t does duty also for the left component of the R, giving an R of the same form as that of "uerb" above. The group then should be read tr. My own confidence that this is correct is strengthened by the fact that, after working out the reading without reference to the sense, I found that it made much better sense than did any other of my attempts at decipherment. nis: Abbreviated form of enis, common in Syriac, nas, but not written in Aramaic except with bar, bar-nas. ci: I at first read this as " cu," taking it as the comparative particle kg-, used as " when." But I can find no authority for its use in that sense in Aramaic. I then showed it to Professor Rowley, who, without knowing anything of the question at issue, was of the opinion that the seeming left arm of the V was the edge of the fracture and not a stroke of the tool. This would make the word ki, which in the Babylonian dialect, and occasionally in Palestinian, means " when." uqu: Of the three letters only the " q " is clear (cf. Van Hoesen, Table D, Dacian wax tablets, line 5, 6th q; Table 4, cols. 8-10, Pap. 56, ca. A.D. 346). The first letter might be o, which would make the form agree with tradition. For this use of q before w, see note on No. I l l , " qum."

Notes on the translation: lieu: If hallku be the verb, it must have been preceded by a subject signifying the persons who committed the crime, and a phrase telling to what place they went. uvisiiae: The single word Uyahe throws the first ray of light upon the tombs of Peter and of Paul as they were prior to the building of Constantine's church. It means " ditch " or " pit." Later writers (v. Buxtorf Lex. col. 2343 foot) sought to restrict the word to the former meaning, but the latter seems to predominate in the texts; it is, for example, used of "winepresses " (Zach. 14, 10) and of the " pits " dug as pitfalls in which to entrap game (Ps. 35, 7; 57, 7; 119, 85). Its use here tends to support the view of those scholars (e.g. Barnes in No. 1) who believe that, after the building of the Memoria or chapel over the grave of Peter by Anacletus (about A.D. 100), the tomb-chamber, originally accessible from the

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road by a stair, was seen by pilgrims through a shaft in the floor of the chapel. By such a visitor it might well be termed a " pit." Of the tomb of Paul nothing definite is known. sicvin: Properly "sleepers," but in common use as a euphemism for " corpses." malu: In Hebrew ma 'al means to "cheat," "swindle." In the later language and in Aramaic it is a technical term of ritual, meaning to mis-use sacred things, especially sacrificial objects, thus cheating God of his due for the sake of one's personal satisfaction. It is thus very close to our "desecrate," "profane," but is not quite its equivalent. udeietu: " A n d what they brought," with the suggestion "thence hither." The expression of the object by the bare relative implicitly excludes the idea that the grave-robbers carried off the bodies of the Apostles; if that had been the writer's meaning he would have said 'eti'unniin, "brought them." So also in line 4 he refers to what they brought by the feminine plural of the pronoun,'innen, often, as here, used like a neuter plural; if he had had the corpses in mind he would have said 'innun. Xo doubt the thieves carried off only such bones as could conveniently be concealed under their clothing or in easily portable bags or baskets or parcels. icto: The verb nebat is not found in the O.T. but occurs both in late Hebrew and in Aramaic. Its proper sense is " to hold in the hand," e.g. bShab. 140b end, " holding a fish in one hand and a pearl in the other." Hence " to carry," e.g. bAb. Zar. 30a of wine. With a metaphorical subject it is used Esther Targ. I, 6, 1 of a spirit which " possesses " a man; Job, 33, 20 of stupor or mental depression which "oppresses" one; so also bYoma 83a; with a metaphorical object, bShab. 151b, middle, to " h o l d " to an argument, or, bSan. 51b to a doctrine, or bShab. 147a to a rule. In derived senses, " t o keep in one's possession" (as in inscription), bNed. 78b, ySan. 30al7: la tignov 'al menat lemilflpat, wela tignov 'al meriat lUsallem, "Thou shalt not steal with the intention of keeping, and thou shalt not steal with the intention of requiting " or " returning." Ex. 21, 37, J I I : [If a man steals an ox or a sheep and butchers or sells it, he shall repay five oxen for one because he prevented it from working, and four sheep for one] de 'alfketeh blginbiiteh '' because by the theft he kept it in his possession " [and it had no work], i.e. he pays fourfold for unlawful possession, but fivefold for unlawful possession which also deprives the owner of the beast's labor. Among other derived meanings are: To "hold" office e.g. bErub. 70a2; to "keep" i.e. reserve time; to "keep" in a class, e.g. one's self among the sick; to "keep" in mind, i.e. bear a grudge, bTaan. 24a7. The sequence of tenses, pf. followed by impf., both referring to time thought as past, is a construction not uncommon in Hebrew but not, so far as I know, hitherto recognized in Aramaic. Little, however, has been done in the study of Aramaic syntax. Even the Syriac grammars devote little space to syntax and list only the more common constructions, and the few grammars of the other dialects are with few exceptions concerned exclusively with morphology. The following illustrations of this construction, picked up in the course of casual reading, will suffice to justify recognition of it in the inscription. Usually the impf. occurs in contexts where reference to the absolute or relative future is possible, although modal value would often seem more appropriate. But there are some cases in which any reference to the future seems definitely excluded: Gen. 42, 1, o, "And Jacob said to his sons, lima tithazon (tittahzon, Dalman, p. 347), why do you keep looking (or, glancing) one at another." Ps. 107 throughout, participles and imperfects follow upon perfects in narration of past events. See also IK., 3, 4 Solomon yasself, " offered up." In the above cases the transla-

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tion follows the constructions of the Hebrew text. But that it is not a purely literary imitation is shown by an anecdote, presumably in the Galilaean vernacular, quoted by Dalman in his Aramäische Leseslücke from jTaan. 64b: " O u r Rabbis saw a certain donkey-driver, yezalle, ümiträ nähet, he was praying (or, began to pray), and the rain comes down.' The same phrase is twice repeated in course of the tale. The idiom is probably a survival of the time when the Jews had as yet but imperfectly learned Aramaic and in later times would tend to be erased from the texts by the purists whom it offended. E.g. Num. 9, 19 o: " When the pillar of cloud stayed many days on the camp weyitteriin bSnt Yisrä' el the children of Israel continued to observe the ordinance of the Lord." This is not an imitation of the Hebrew, which has the pf. sämerü, but it is supported by JI, w&yinterün, and probably comes from the old Palestinian Targum which is believed by some scholars to lie behind both Onkelos and Jonathan. But in Berliner's text it is "corrected" to the participle, wenäterln. So in the parallel passage, Ex. 13, 22: The pillar did not at any time depart, lä ya'äde, Berliner 'öde, but here the Hebrew has the same construction, yämis, and JI diverges. ore: höre, "behind," is usually accompanied by one or both of two determinants, one of direction, lehöre, la'ähöre, "backwards," min höre, "from behind,"—and one of person or thing, e.g. yBab. m. 8c3: bar näs häwä mehallek höre Rav Hälaftä "A man was walking behind Hab Halaphta." But in this case it would have been difficult to express a determinant. The writer is standing on the left side of the triclia, writing on its rear wall, with his back to the court. The place to which he refers is directly behind him, about 25 feet below the level of the court. As he writes he has in mind both himself and the reader for whom he writes, hence he cannot well say "behind me," which would be incongruous for the reader, nor yet, "behind you," for there is no direct address to the reader in the inscription. The fact that the reader will necessarily occupy the same position as the writer supplies sufficient determination. Since höre here makes perfect sense and no other word will, if examination of the original shows that the final letter is i and not e, one should, I think, regard it as another pronunciation of the word. According to Dalman (pp. 54r-55; 282-3), the Yemenite pointing frequently has i for e when the Sentence-accent falls upon that syllable, as it probably would in this case before the shift from Aramaic to Latin. deteriore loco: " A n inferior burial-place." The d could be read as v, but a passage in yMö 'ed K. 81b51 (reference from Krauss, Talmudische Archäologie I, n. 505a) makes d preferable: "One does not remove a corpse or its bones from an honorable grave to an honorable (mikubbad), nor from a contemptible to a contemptible (bäzüy), nor from a contemptible to an honorable, nor—need it be said? —from an honorable to a contemptible. But [one does] in case of his own [i.e. the family-tomb], even though it be from an honorable to a contemptible, for it is pleasing to a man to rest with his fathers." loco: Often used in funerary inscriptions, without further determination, as meaning "burial-place." uerb: For ühreb; compare I, "aharia" for 'ahräyä, and II, " t o r g c " for tSrögik. The adjective would probably have beenmore appropriate to Tomb E (Fig. 2) than to either of the others, for it seems to have been "desolate" in the sense of being disused and neglected by its owners some fifty years before the date of the robbery. Mancini mentions 27 bodies found in it, and seems to imply that there was no room for further interments. Three could be distinguished as among the latest made there: (a) a terracotta coffin laid on a bench and covered with tiles made toward the end of the second century, (b) a grave cut in the pavement with the debris still piled beside it, containing a coin of Faustina Junior, wife of Marcus

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Aurelius (160-181), (c) an ash-cist, standing on the floor, with an inscription not earlier than 193. Tomb E was probably "desolate" not long after 200. Tomb, C D was in use as late as 244; in Tomb B no evidence of date was discovered. inen: The pronouns 'innun, 'innen, as subjects often precede the verb but as objects they usually follow it. The text, however, here is so legible and the meaning so patent that the slip in grammar, if it be one, may safely be disregarded. lul: The second I is not well made, but there can be little doubt, to one who considers it without preconception, what letter it is intended to represent. Professor Kent read the word independently as lul without hesitation. The word occurs both in Hebrew and in Aramaic, but is rare; it is found in the Bible but once (/ Kings, 6, 8), not at all in the Targums and is not common in the Talmuds. As its meaning is critical for the interpretation of the inscription, and as some differences of opinion exist among the lexicographers, I have taken pains to ascertain precisely what it does mean, of which I had no idea at all when I first read it. The Palestinian "house," bet, was a large room on the ground floor with a flat roof. Frequently a second room was built upon the roof, occupying a portion of the roof only, the remainder serving as a terrace. This was termed the 'allyya, or "upper room." It was frequently rented and was accessible independently of the bet by means of ladders from the street and the court. But in many houses a means of access between the bet and the roof or the 'tiliyya was provided in the form of an opening in the ceiling of the bet to which a ladder or stair ascended. This was the lul. The definition, therefore, is strictly correct which Kimchi (on I Kings, 6, 8) quotes as that of "our Rabbis" (from bMenach. 34a): lul happatu&h mibbet la 'Allyya, "a lul is the opening from a bet to an 'tiMyya." That the lul was the opening and not the ladder or stair is shown by a passage in bPes. 26a: "There were open liilin in the upper room of the Holy of Holies through which they used to lower (misalsilln) the workmen in tebot, in order that they might not feast their eyes on the Holy of Holies." The tebot, "boxes", must have been wooden "cages" high enough to prevent a man standing within from seeing over the top. The conclusions reached by Stade also (Z. A. T. W., 3, 136 f.) are substantially correct, although he makes the mistake of translating the word by FaUthur, "trap-door," which is ambiguous; the lul is not the cover but the aperture, and it might or might not be covered. It is in this sense that the word is used in bPes. 34a: "There was a small lul between the ramp and the altar on the west side of the ramp into which they used to throw the unfit for sacrifice found among the sin-offerings of fowl, and when their shape was lost [through decay] they removed them to the burning-place." In the parallel passages referred to by Jastrow, bZeb. 62b and 104a, instead of lul the words 'awlr and rewah are used, both of which mean "open space," and are substituted, probably, because the original meaning of lul had been forgotten. The lul must have been almost always furnished with a ladder or stair, and in time its original meaning became obscured by a new one, that of an indoor ladder or stair. From this, in turn, is derived the lul lei tarnggola, "chicken-roost." No doubt, in oriental houses, chickens frequently roosted in the lul before a lul of their own was provided for them. As civilization advanced, the primitive lul was replaced by the built-in staircase and the term was transferred to the latter; this also is the meaning which it conveys to the later translators and commentators. In the Targum on 1 Kings, 6, 8, lulirn is translated ml^ibbata, the meaning of which is made clear by bTarn. 25a: [The priests whose duty it was to open the Temple court in the morning slept overnight in an upper room. Upon occasion one would] "go out and take the mg^ibba which went below the building" [i.e. the Temple], "with lights burning on either side, until he reached the bath-room {tenia}." The m$$ibba must be a built-in stair connecting the upper floors with the lower. The Peshitta version

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of the same passage translates lulim by Ipaiarakte, the late Greek word KarappaicTris, which has various meanings. Its meaning here Payne-Smith (Thes. Syr. s.r.1 illustrates by a Syriac scholion on one of Barhebraeus' hymns: "A stair by which people go up from one floor to another, or, doors which shut off the upper rooms." Another passage which implies a more advanced type of architecture is yYoma 38c39: "Lulim, these above those" [i.e. one above anotherin a staircase well] "are subject to ynezuza" [i.e. the nailing to the doorpost of Deut. 6, 4-9; 11, 13-21] "on the part of him who treads" [i.e. has the right to use] " t h e step next the ground" (Interpretation from Jastrow). In the middle ages the meaning of the word was conceived in terms of mediaeval architecture, hence both Rashi and Kimchi, in their commentaries on 1 Kings, 6, 8, describe the lul at length as a winding stair enclosed in a turret or well. Strange to say, this anachronistic conception is repeated in all the lexicons and has even found its way into the new Jewish translation of the O.T. ur: Possibly "or," but in either case it represents Syr. hur, Heb. and Aram, hor, " a cavity" or "hole." It is used in the O.T. of relatively shallow cavities, as the eye sockets (Zech. 14, 12), cavities in the earth or rocks used as hiding-places, which would include the natural and artificial caves and rock-shelters so numerous in Palestine (Job, 30, 6; Nah. 2, 13; 1 Sam. 14, 11), and the horin described bSticc. 20b end, as scooped out by water, by reptiles or by salt and used as shelters. It is used also of a hole through, a wall (Ez. 8, 7), a door {Cant. 5, 4), a chest-lid {2 Kings, 12, 10). In bNed. 50b2 it seems to mean a "burrow." Here it certainly refers to the rock-cut tombs and is an eminently appropriate word for them, since it is applied indifferently to artificial and to natural "caves." lul ur atro: The combination of two nouns in the construct case depending upon a third is not graceful but has numerous parallels, e.g. Targ. Jer. 7, 4, 8; 8, 1; 18, 21; 39, 15; 40, 1; 44, 26; 63, 10. " A t r o " is the emphatic case of 'atar, but the confusion of absolute and emphatic is shown for this writer by "sicvin" " corpses " for sikbayya or sikbe, " t h e corpses, " which is certainly what he means. I have therefore translated '' a stair of a cave of the place " with a view to the meaning only. Beneath the court were three "caves" with five "stairs," but there was but one "place," locus, which contained them all. uqu: The word properly means " t o be narrow," hence, " t o be pressed," but is generally used of mental "pressure," or depression, anxiety, distress.

Commentary: Inscription No. V is one of the earlier of the graffiti found in the triclia; the space which it occupies is one of those which would naturally first be chosen, and another has been scratched over it, no doubt because the wall surface had become overcrowded. Moreover, it alludes to the structures then concealed beneath the court, "caves" and stairs, and excavation has proved these allusions to be correct. Unquestionably it was written by a contemporary of the events which it relates and is to be accepted as trustworthy. It proves the legend of the robbery to be a tradition faithful in the main to the facts. One fact related by the tradition but not in No. V, namely, that the thieves were Orientals, has already been supplied by No. IV, which proves that one of the "caves" was used as a place of burial by Orientals about the time the robbery took place. The earthquake remains unconfirmed, but is not improbable. Earthquakes are not infrequent in Rome, and an earth-

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quake, especially if it occurred while the thieves were gloating over their stolen treasure in the "cave," might well have so aroused their superstitious fears as to prompt one of them to turn informer. But the earthquake, if earthquake there were, did not arouse the Roman Christians to pursue the thieves and rescue the relics,—that is an embellishment of the story added by the imagination of narrators. The prowess of the united Roman Church discomfiting the thieves in their hiding-place is a subject of contemplation more edifying than a tattle-tale sneaking away to betray his comrades. And yet, there were those who remembered and honored the tattle-tale. Not long after I discovered and translated No. V, I read Dr. Styger's article, No. 10. On pages 198-99 he quotes from the manuscript notes on San Sebastiano, now preserved in the Vatican Library, of one Panvinio, an Augustinian monk of Verona, who visited the Church about 1550 while preparing material for a book on the Roman basilicas. The book was published in 1570, after his death, but the precious bit of information contained in this note is not in the printed edition. After describing the Platonia, Panvinio proceeds : . . . e a mezza scala vi è uno Altare quadrato, dove dormi quel vilano, che li rivelò li corpi, e vi è tanta indulgenza, quanto andar ogni dì a So. Pietro e a So. Paolo e 6000 Anni di indulgentia ogni giorno: dipoi furono trovati li corpi, furono messi a mezza la chiesa, dove è quella feriata So. Pietro : e dove è da la scala So. Paolo.

The "square altar, half-way down the stair, where that peasant slept who there revealed the bodies", was still standing, in a small chapel to the left of the stair, in 1893 (A. de Waal, Die Apostelgruft ad Catacumbas, in R. Q. S. Supplementheft 1894, pp. 62sq.; 87 sq.). It bore a sculptured relief of the Good Shepherd of the 4th or 5th century, and the chapel was of the same period. Beneath the chapel a chamber had been filled with earth, probably in the 12th century; beneath the chamber was found a plain sarcophagus and near it a third century statue of a man. The chapel collapsed during the excavations. The altar must have been erected when the stair was built, about A.D. 400. Eleven hundred and fifty years later Panvinio for the first time records the fact that an informer had betrayed the hidingplace of the relics, now confirmed by inscription No. V, and that the altar marked a grave, now confirmed by de Waal. There is little reason to doubt that Panvinio is also right in saying that the grave was that of the informer. How items of fact so trivial, directly contradicting the popular version of the Martyrdoms, survived for nearly twelve centuries at San Sebastiano without being mentioned in literature or by the pilgrims who visited the shrine, is a problem which remains to be

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solved. Possibly an inscription had been there discovered not long before Panvinio's visit which afterwards was lost or destroyed. Whether it is possible to identify the staircase in which the relics were hidden is a question which I must leave to the decision of the archaeologists on the spot; the problems involved require for their solution more intimate knowledge than is to be acquired from the study of plans. I may, however, point out that, if the writer of the inscription is referring, as I have above assumed, to the tombs buried under the court, the choice would lie between E and CD, both of which were found with their doors blocked up to protect them from injury, while B had been left wide open and was in consequence filled with earth. The staircase in E was nearly under the approximate " c e n t r e " of the court, and the second staircase in CD was nearly under the niche marked / ; either of these locations might or might not have been intended as an identifying mark. There is, however, another staircase behind the writer's position, although more to the right and further distant, which, marked u in Figure 2 and leading to the underground gallery M, was certainly in existence in his time. This gallery M is regarded by Professor Marucchi as the probable hiding-place of the relics. Its claims are much weakened by the fact that for more than a thousand years the Memoria Apostolorum was definitely located by tradition within the church, as Styger has proved, but they are entitled to a hearing. The passage quoted from the Talmud on p. 321 shows that, if the tomb-robbers were Jews, they might well have alleged in defence of the theft the excuse at which Damasus hints, the duty of restoring the bodies of Jews to their ancestral tombs. But it may be doubted whether that was their real motive. There are not lacking indications that the owners of Tombs E and CD in the second and third centuries were not orthodox Christians. Tomb E was probably constructed about the year 100. Somewhat later, perhaps about the middle of the century, half of the upper chamber was remodelled, the ceiling being somewhat lowered, and the new ceiling was decorated with frescoes still in fairly good condition. The central medallion depicts a youth carrying the wand which is the standing symbol of supernatural power; on the ground beside him is something which resembles a roll, the symbol of a message; his attitude is that of one who makes a proclamation. Facing him in a semicircle are thirty diminutive figures. The number is given by Mancini, and is the more to be trusted because he sees no significance in it. One could scarcely ask a more appropriate representation of a scene in the system of Ptolemy, the Italian Valentinian, in which the new Aeon Christ proclaims to the Thirty Aeons the nature of the Father (Iren. adv. Haer. I, 1, 5 Mass.; I, p.

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21 Harvey). On either side of this picture are two smaller medallions, one depicting a corpse in a green robe being carried out to burial, the other, a person in a green robe being presented by a second person to a judge seated upon a bench, behind whom stand in a group four assessors. This corresponds as appropriately to a scene known only from the fragments of Marcus, another Valentinian, in which the soul, while ascending through the spheres, invokes its " M o t h e r , " "assessor of God and of the mystic Silence," who is, as another passage tells (op. cit., I, 15, 1 M ; I, p. 146 H), the "First Tetrad," " t h e Mother of All": "Behold the Judge is near and the Herald bids me make my defence; do thou who knowest the [nature?] of both (rd anfoTtpuv) present to the Judge the defence of us both on the ground that it is one" (op. cit., I, 13, 6 M ; I, p. 125 H). In the picture the Herald is presenting the soul to the Judge, and the four assessors represent the Tetrad, which has already responded to the soul's appeal. After his account of the Marcosian " r e d e m p t i o n " Irenaeus gives a few particulars of similar rites practiced by other gnostic sects. One of these is a ritual of extreme unction in which the dying man is taught a "confession" which will secure him passage through the lower powers, and another to be presented to the Judge, the Demiurge (op. cit., I, 21, 4 M ; I, 186 H). The wording differs from that of the Marcosians and the appeal is addressed to Sophia, but the scene must have been conceived in much the same way. Epiphanius, in repeating this account (Pan. haer. 36), attributes it to Heracleon, one of the Italian Valentinians. Epiphanius is not a good authority, but the attribution is not improbable. In Tomb C D also there are indications of gnostic ideas. The name " D a d o u d a s " is one which any Christian might have taken. But among the Yalentinian Gnostics it had peculiar significance, for in one of the few extant fragments of Valentinus' own works it is declared to be the distinctive name of the Gnostic: Clem. Alex. Strom. VI, 6, p. 767 P " M a n y of the things written in the popular (iwoCTious) books are found written in the Church of G o d " (i.e. the Valentinian Church), " f o r the common (principles),—these are the words from the heart, the Law written in the heart, this is the People of the Beloved, which is loved by and which loves Him."

Close by the inscription of Paula and Xanthias are three loculi bearing strange and puzzling legends (No. 33, figs. 21-23): AiiBOTZra PAIANIZ IN[NOKENTI fiPOM]

raPAIANSi

nonHNm

INNOKENTI Ì2POM

BAABEINS2 INNOKENTI S2POM

In the first were found the skeletons of two young men; the other two have not been opened.

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The term innocens in the early Church means "one who has never sinned," and the Roman prophet Hermas (Sim. 9, 29) ranks their souls in heaven above the good bishops, even above the martyrs. It is not uncommon on Christian epitaphs. But these three epitaphs present a definite problem: five persons, dying within a few years one of another, are declared to belong to a recognized class of people who have committed no sin. Who are these people? Mancini thinks a burial club, which is very likely, but the problem remains: Why did the members of the club declare themselves to be persons who had committed no sin? The Gnostics taught that in certain favored human souls there is implanted a spiritual germ which is to be educated, developed, individualized by its life on earth, but which is destined to salvation because it is incapable of sin. Those souls only that possess this germ are "gnostic," capable of comprehending spiritual truth when they hear it, they alone comprise the "Church of God," " t h e People of the Beloved." These germs are often called vrjina., " i n fantile" in the double sense of "undeveloped," (e.g. Clem. Alex. Exc. 68: areXij Kai vrjiria Kai &poj>a Kai aa) and " i n nocent," (cf. Hermas, Sim. 9, 29, 1: cos vrj-mafiptyr;daiv, oTs ovSe/iia Kaxia. avaQaivti kwi rqv Kapbiav ovSe eyvunav T'L 'eari -wovqpia aWa Travrore h vTjTTLOTTjTL Siifi€Lvav. Ib. 9, 31, 3". Felices vos iudico omnes . . . quicumque estis innocentes sicut infantes). Another problem is presented by these epitaphs which is at present insoluble. The " t w o Gordians," father and son, were assassinated in Africa, July 6, 238, after a reign of three weeks; "Popenius and Balbeinus" were assassinated in Rome, 15 Oct. 238, after a reign of three months; " G o r d i a n " the younger was assassinated in Mesopotamia, 29 March, 244, after a reign of six years (dates from G. Costa in Ruggiero, Diet. Epigrafico, I I I , 544). Evidently five of the " I n n o c e n t s " have been buried under the names of the five Emperors. Cui bono? I can but suggest that we have here some rite of baptism for the dead otherwise unknown. But at all events it is obvious that these people, who write broken Latin in Greek letters, call themselves " t h e sinless ones" and take at death the names of deceased Emperors, are not orthodox Roman Christians. The doctrine of the ascent of the soul through the planetary spheres to which Pecoris alludes is found in most of the gnostic systems but was never accepted by orthodox theology, although it found its way into the minds of many orthodox Christians. If the bones found in the area before the three tombs were those of Pecoris' family, it is probable that, in the emergency which confronted her, she ventured to bury them there because she knew that the tombs were owned by fellow sectarians who might respect the graves, and, as I have shown, her confidence was not misplaced.

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The name " E u p h r a t e s " is rare in Rome; in C.I.L., VI one finds only T. Julius Eufra . . . (5597) and C. Julius Eufra . . . (19976). It is, perhaps, worthy of note that both Origen (c. Cels, VI, 28) and Hippolytus (Phil. IV, 2; V, 13; X, 10) know of one Euphrates, founder of the gnostic sect of the Peratae, but they tell nothing of the date or place of his death. If the burial-place ad Catacumbas was, in the second and third centuries, in the possession of Gnostics, the theft of the relics admits of a plausible explanation. It is well known that, about the middle of the second century, a determined effort to capture the Roman Church was made by the gnostic leaders. Valentinus, Marcion and a certain Marcellina, follower of Carpocrates, all came to Rome and undertook a vigorous and successful propaganda. So alarmed did the orthodox party become that Anicetus, Bishop of Rome, induced the ancient Polycarp to make the long journey from Smyrna to Rome in order to testify in person before the Roman Christians that his master John, the disciple of the Lord, had known nothing of these new doctrines. Thenceforward the lines were sharply drawn, and persons recognized as Gnostics were excluded from the Roman Church. The Gnostics were not separatists; they aimed to win over the main body of Christians by "boring from within," and must have resented the policy of exclusion. And one can readily understand how the more ignorant and superstitious among them must have especially resented being shut out from the benefits conferred by the wonder-working relics of Peter and Paul, and might well have resolved to obtain by any means those precious treasures to which they believed mere "psychic" Christians had no right. Furthermore, if the locus ad Catacumbas had been the burialplace of heretics, the strange treatment accorded it by the Church authorities becomes comprehensible. In the eyes of the common people it was as sacred as any martyr's grave; the physical presence of the relics had assured the continued presence of the Apostles,— here one might invoke them with full confidence that they would hear and answer. Such beliefs in general had the sanction of the Church. The graves of the martyrs were sacred spots, suitable for the celebration of the Eucharist and for prayer, and the dearest hope of many a Christian was that he might himself be buried ad Sanctos. The burial-chambers of the martyrs in the catacombs were frequently enlarged and decorated, and special stairs were constructed to make access to them easier for the throngs of the faithful that frequented them. In the fourth century the entire area around such a grave was in several instances excavated down to its level and a semi-subterranean church built, in order that its altar might stand over the grave without disturbing the repose of

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the saint by moving his bones. Special arrangements were made to enable worshippers to approach as close as possible to the relics, and to bring objects in contact with the coffin that they might be sanctified by the holy effluences proceeding from it. But ad Catacumbas special pains were taken to make the spot where the bones had rested forever inaccessible, perhaps even to obliterate the memory of it from men's minds. It was buried under twenty feet of earth and thereover was laid a flat, uniform court, devoid, it would seem, of any mark indicating the precise location of the sacred spot. For, sacred though it was in the eyes of the common people, the authorities must have regarded it as indelibly polluted by the presence of the bones of heretics, and they must also have feared that the simple folk who persisted in resorting thither might be seduced into the paths that lead to destruction. And yet they too must have felt that a spot where the Apostles had dwelt could not be treated like any other spot. The presence of these inconsistent motives in the minds of the builders explains the contradictory characteristics of the original Memoria Apostolorum. It was intended to obliterate every trace of heresy, to consign to eternal oblivion the indignity to which the Saints had been subjected, and yet to perpetuate the memory of the fact hie habüasse prius sanctos. Those builders planned well. For more than fifteen hundred years the heretics have been forgotten, but the memory of the Apostles has never been forgotten ad Catacumbas. But at last the spade of the archaeologist has defeated their pious intentions and has brought to light the evidence they sought to destroy. These last three inscriptions are of considerable importance. Not, however, because they prove that relics believed to be those of Peter and Paul once rested at San Sebastiano. That fact has already been established by the excavations of Styger and Mancini. Nor yet because they prove that the "legend of the oriental thieves" is true. Both of these questions are of legitimate interest to the curious, but neither is of importance to history or to religion. Yet the evidence brought to light by Styger and Mancini and that afforded by these three inscriptions, taken as a whole, has an importance of its own. For it contributes something towards the establishment of a principle of cardinal importance to the historian, a principle long neglected but in recent years constantly winning more recognition, chiefly through the discoveries of archaeology, the principle that direct testimony to matters of fact is not lightly to be disregarded in favor of merely theoretical combinations of possibilities. And this holds good not only as regards the testimony of a reliable witness, such as Damasus, but even of that anonymous testimony which passes under the name of "tradition." WM. T H E U N I V E R S I T Y OF P E N N S Y L V A N I A

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