traveldk.com

The many layers of this fascinating church reveal the changing ideals of Rome in various eras.

Underground font, San Clemente

The burial tunnels of Rome’s early Christians are like a honeycomb beneath the consular roads out of Rome, especially along Via Appia Antica. Grave niches stacked like shelving along dark corridors are carved into the tufa, with some precious remnants of fresco and engraved marble slabs (see Beyond the City Walls).

The famous Red Wall behind which Peter was supposedly buried was discovered under the Vatican in the 1940s (see Crypt).

Like most of “underground Rome”, Nero’s fabulous and vast palace was not originally buried. But when Renaissance worthies such as Raphael chopped holes in the roof and lowered themselves into the sumptuously decorated rooms on ropes, they called the spaces “grottoes”, and named the intricate frescoed designs of foliage and fantastical creatures “grotesques” (see Nero’s Golden House (Domus Aurea)).

This was Rome’s ancient central lockdown (built 7th–6th century BC). Among its celebrity inmates were Vercingetorix, a rebel Celtic chieftain, styled the last king of Gaul, who was brought to Rome in chains, and St Peter, who left an impression of his face where the guards reportedly slammed him against the stairwell wall. Downstairs is also the alleged column to which St Peter was chained.

A jumble of excavations from all eras, including a piece of 13 BC crypta (porticoed courtyard) attached to a destroyed theatre. The museum’s didactic panels, which are an excellent introduction to Rome’s layer effect, plus the medieval frescoes are more interesting than the rather plain excavations underneath.

This house under an ancient church belonged to two Constantinian officials, martyred in AD 362. There is also a series of buildings, including a frescoed nymphaeum, dating from the 1st to 4th centuries.

The museum’s basement dates from the 4th century AD: walls, flooring, column stumps, a bit of cornice and sculpted relief, a marble basin and a large double pestle for hand-grinding grains can be seen.

Pompey’s 61–55 BC theatre is still evident in the curve of medieval buildings on Largo del Pollaro. Its fabric is visible only in the basements, including the downstairs rooms of the da Pancrazio restaurant installed in the ancient travertine corridors.

Under this church lies a 2nd-century AD shrine to Mithraism, a popular religion among Rome’s soldiers and lower classes while Christianity was gaining with patricians (see Santo Stefano Rotondo).