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§ 82. Literature.



I. Older works. By Bosio (Roma Sotterranea, Rom. 1632; abridged edition by P. Giovanni Severani da S. Severino, Rom. 1710, very rare); Boldetti (1720); Bottari (1737); D’AGINCOURT (1825); Röstell (1830); Marchi (1844); Maitland (The Church in the Catacombs, Lond. 1847); Louis Perret (Catacombes de Rome, etc. Paris, 1853 sqq. 5 vols., with 325 splendid plates, but with a text that is of little value, and superseded).


II. More recent works.

*Giovanni Battista de Rossi (the chief authority on the Catacombs): La Roma Sotterranea Cristiana descritta et illustrata, publ. by order of Pope Pio Nono, Roma (cromolitografia Pontificia), Tom. I. 1864, Tom. II. 1867, Tom. III. 1877, in 3 vols. fol. with two additional vols. of plates and inscriptions. A fourth volume is expected. Comp. his articles in the bimonthly "Bulletino di archeologia Cristiana," Rom. 1863 sqq., and several smaller essays. Roller calls De Rossi "le fouilleur le mieux qualifié fervent catholique, mais critique sérieux."

*J. Spencer Northcote (Canon of Birmingham) and W. R. Brownlow (Canon of Plymouth): Roma Sotteranea. London (Longmans, Green & Co., 1869; second edition, "rewritten and greatly enlarged," 1879, 2 vols. The first vol. contains the History, the second, Christian Art. This work gives the substance of the investigations of Commendatore De Rossi by his consent, together with a large number of chromo-lithographic plates and wood-engravings, with special reference to the cemetery of San Callisto. The vol. on Inscriptions is separate, see below.

F. X. Kraus (R.C.), Roma Sotterranea. Die Röm. Katakomben. Freiburg. i. B. (1873), second ed. 1879. Based upon De Rossi and the first ed. of Northcote & Brownlow.

D. de Richemont: Les catacombes de Rome. Paris, 1870.

Wharton B. Marriott, B.S.F.S.A. (Ch. of England): The Testimony of the Catacombs and of other Monuments of Christian Art from the second to the eighteenth century, concerning questions of Doctrine now disputed in the Church. London, 1870 (223 pages with illustrations). Discusses the monuments referring to the cultus of the Virgin Mary, the supremacy of the Pope, and the state after death.

F. Becker: Roms Altchristliche Cömeterien. Leipzig, 1874.

W. H. Withrow (Methodist): The Catacombs of Rome and their Testimony relative to Primitive Christianity. New York (Nelson & Phillips), 1874. Polemical against Romanism. The author says (Pref., p. 6): "The testimony of the catacombs exhibits, more strikingly than any other evidence, the immense contrast between primitive Christianity and modern Romanism."

John P. Lundy (Episc.): Monumental Christianity: or the Art and Symbolism of the Primitive Church as Witnesses and Teachers of the one Catholic Faith and Practice. New York, 1876. New ed. enlarged, 1882, 453 pages, richly illustrated.

*John Henry Parker (Episc.): The Archaeology of Rome. Oxford and London, 1877. Parts ix. and x.: Tombs in and near Rome, and Sculpture; Part XII: The Catacombs. A standard work, with the best illustrations.

*Theophile Roller (Protest.): Les Catacombes de Rome. Histoire de l’art et des croyances religieuses pendant les premiers siècles du Christianisme. Paris, 1879–1881, 2 vols. fol, 720 pages text and 100 excellent plates en hétiogravure, and many illustrations and inscriptions. The author resided several years at Naples and Rome as Reformed pastor.

M. Armellini (R.C.): Le Catacombe Romane descritte. Roma, 1880 (A popular extract from De Rossi, 437 pages). By the same the more important work: Il Cimiterio di S. Agnese sulla via Nomentana. Rom. 1880.

Dean Stanley: The Roman Catacombs, in his "Christian Institutions." Lond. and N. York, 1881 (pp. 272–295).

Victor Schultze (Lutheran): Archaeologische Studien ueber altchristliche Monumente. Mit 26 Holzschnitten. Wien, 1880; Die Katakomben. Die altchristlichen Grabstätten. Ihre Geschichte und ihre Monumente (with 52 illustrations). Leipzig, 1882 (342 pages); Die Katakomben von San Gennaro dei Poveri in Neapel. Jena, 1877. Also the pamphlet: Der theolog. Ertrag der Katakombenforschung. Leipz. 1882 (30 pages). The last pamphlet is against Harnack’s review, who charged Schultze with overrating the gain of the catacomb-investigations (see the "Theol. Literaturzeitung," 1882.)

Bishop W. J. Kip: The Catacombs of Rome as illustrating the Church of the First Three Centuries. N. York, 1853, 6th ed., 1887(212pages).

K. Rönneke: Rom’s christliche Katakomben. Leipzig, 1886.

Comp. also Edmund Venables in Smith and Cheetham, I. 294–317; Heinrich Merz in Herzog, VII. 559–568; Theod. Mommsen on the Roman Catac. in "The Contemp. Review." vol. XVII. 160–175 (April to July, 1871); the relevant articles in the Archaeol. Dicts. of Martigny and Kraus, and the Archaeology of Bennett (1888).


III. Christian Inscriptions in the catacombs and other old monuments.

*Commendatore J. B. de Rossi: Inscriptiones Christiana Urbis Romae septimo seculo antiquiores. Romae, 1861 (XXIII. and 619 pages). Another vol. is expected. The chief work in this department. Many inscriptions also in his Roma Sott. and "Bulletino."

Edward Le Blant: Inscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule anterieures au VIIIme siècle. Paris, 1856 and 1865, 2 vols. By the same: Manuel d’Epigraphie chrétienne. Paris, 1869.

John McCaul: Christian Epitaphs of the First Six Centuries. Toronto, 1869. Greek and Latin, especially from Rome.

F. Becker: Die Inschriften der römischen Cömeterien. Leipzig, 1878.

*J. Spencer Northcote (R.C. Canon of Birmingham): Epitaphs of the Catacombs or Christian Inscriptions in Rome during the First Four Centuries. Lond., 1878 (196 pages).

G. T. Stokes on Greek and Latin Christian Inscriptions; two articles in the "Contemporary Review" for 1880 and 1881.

V. Schultze discusses the Inscriptions in the fifth section of his work Die Katakomben (1882), pp. 235–274, and gives the literature.

The Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum by Böckh, and Kirchhoff, and the Corpus Inscriptionium Lat, edited for the Berlin Academy by, Th. Mommsen and others, 1863 sqq. (not yet completed), contain also Christian Inscriptions. Prof. E. Hübner has added those of Spain (1871) and Britain (1873). G. Petrie has collected the Christian Inscriptions in the Irish language, ed. by Stokes. Dublin, 1870 sqq. Comp. the art. "Inscriptions," in Smith and Cheetham, I. 841.


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