Evidence ID
E04664Saint Name
Caecilia, virgin and martyr of Rome : S00146Type of Evidence
Inscriptions - Formal inscriptions (stone, mosaic, etc.)
Archaeological and architectural - Internal cult fixtures (crypts, ciboria, etc.)Evidence not before
690Evidence not after
850Activity not before
690Activity not after
850Place of Evidence - Region
Rome and regionPlace of Evidence - City, village, etc
Suburban catacombs and cemeteriesPlace of evidence - City name in other Language(s)
Suburban catacombs and cemeteries
Rome
Rome
Roma
Ῥώμη
RhōmēCult activities - Places
Burial site of a saint - crypt/ crypt with relicsCult Activities - Protagonists in Cult and Narratives
Ecclesiastics - bishops
Ecclesiastics - lesser clergy
Other lay individuals/ peopleCult Activities - Relics
Bodily relic - entire body
Transfer, translation and deposition of relicsSource
The inscription (or inscriptions, as we do not know if they formed a continuous text), come from the wall closing the 'crypt of Caecilia' in the cemetery of Callistus. The letters are painted in black on white plaster. Letter height 3.5-4.5 cm. based on the drawing offered by Giovanni Battista de Rossi and Antonia Ferrua, one can infer that the text ran around a painted border. Single letters and an ivy leaf from an inscription within the border are also visible in the drawing.
First published by de Rossi in 1867. Republished by Ferrua in 1964.Discussion
The first fragment very plausibly records the name of a certain Ioannes, named as a servant of God or of a saint.
The second fragment probably contains the term λείψανα. De Rossi suggested that it could refer to a memoria built on the site where Caecilia's relics were deposited. He also interpreted some of the letters visible on the plaster as a reference to a date: III ΚΑΛ - the third day before the calendae of an unspecified month. This he identifies as the date of invention or of translation of Caecilia's relics, as it is different from the dates of her feasts as recorded in martyrologies.
Dating: The shape of letters suggests a late date: 8th c., or even later. De Rossi notes that this time-frame corresponds to the pontificate of pope Paschal I (817-824) who moved the relics of Caecilia to the church dedicated to her in Trastevere in 820. De Rossi also hypothetically identified Ioannes from fragment 1 with a certain presbyter Ioannes, titular priest of Santa Cecilia, mentioned in the acts of the council of Rome in AD 879 (see de Rossi 1867, 127). Ferrua notes that although the identification of this Ioannes with our supplicant is very tentative, a date in the 9th c., for the present inscription, is very reasonable. The body of Caecila was removed from the catacomb in 820, and dedications to her are unlikely to postdate this event. Antonio Felle in the Epigraphic Database Bari, however, dates this text to the very late 7th-early 8th c. (690-725).Bibliography
Edition:
Epigraphic Database Bari, no. EDB20192, see http://www.edb.uniba.it/epigraph/20192
De Rossi, G.B., Ferrua, A. (eds.) Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae Septimo Saeculo Antiquiores, n.s., vol. 4: Coemeteria inter Vias Appiam et Ardeatinam (Vatican: Pont. Institutum Archaeologiae Christianae, 1964), no. 9529.
de Rossi, G.B., La Roma sotterranea cristiana, vol. 2 (Rome: Cromo-litografia pontificia, 1867), 126, and Tav. XXXI.
