Scavi

On November 2nd, half of our Religion class took a tour of the Necropolis Scavi underneath St. Peter's Basilica. The new Basilica was built in the 1100's and was built on top of Constantine's Basilica. When Constantine's Basilica was built on top of Vatican HIll which used to be a cemetery. Some of the old graves were relocated to the foot of the hill or right across the current street. Some of the graves were buried in the rubble of Constantine's Basilica when the new Basilica was being built and these are the graves that are being excavated today. The excavations are temperatrure controlled; The excavations are kept like a greenhouse to keep bacteria from growing on the relics.

There are many types of tombs that were uncovered. Rooms of graves of family members, single marble tombs, and urns with ashes of deceased. The original goal of the excavations were to see if the existence of Simon Peter's were in fact under the Basilica, reaffirming that the Catholic Church was built upon Peter, the 'rock' of the Church.

Our teacher took us through the excavations and pointed out the main tombs and connected them to things we learned in class. Many of the tombs had no connection to Christianity and were Pagan tombs. Some of the tombs could have been Pagan tombs that were reused for Christians, and there were a couple Christian tombs with the Chi Rho symbol on it designating them Christian.

We got to see the Altar of the Constantine's Basilica, and the "Victory Altar". Two sets of bones were found close to here. The first set included a middle aged male, about 30 years old, and the bones of some small animals. It was thought that these might have been sacrifices when the individual was laid to rest. The other set of bones were found here and every hone in the human body was found but the feet, and the bones of the feet. The bones could be dated to an individual who was about 60 years old and that was about how old Peter was when he was crucified upside down and his feet were cut off when he was taken down from the cross.

Create your own conclusions, but there is pretty good evidence that shows Simon Peter may have been buried under Constantine's Basilica. it was a very cool experience. Under the current Bailica there are also graves of prior Popes, the graves include Pope John Paul II, and Pope Pius XII.

Unfortunately you cannot take pictures there so I don't have anything to show you, but you can do more reading on the scavi here: http://goo.gl/ORG14 and http://goo.gl/0O6xR

EMERGENCY BLOG - Da Li Cochi

My life is complete! Just got our picture taken with Marco and Matteo. Check the Christmas decorations out!

I promise I'll finish up my posts about the last month and my trips to Dublin and Barcelona soon!