but also by agnostic students of classical history. A tombstone, which
on one side is inscribed with the records of the victories gained by
the imperial legions, on the other with the simple and humble name of
a Christian who has given his life for his faith, is a monument worthy
the consideration of all thoughtful men. Christian archaeology has an
intimate and indissoluble connection with classical studies, and there
is no discovery referring to the first century of Christianity which
does not throw new and often unexpected light on general history, art,
and science. Those made at Torre Marancia in 1875 illustrate the
history of Rome and the Campagna, after the fall of the empire. In the
niche where the episcopal chair was placed,--behind the high altar, in
the middle of the apse,--a rough hand has sketched the figure of a
priest, dressed in a casula, in the act of preaching from his seat.
This sketch reminds us of Gregory the Great, when in this very
cemetery of Nereus and Achilleus, in this very apse, he read one of
his homilies from this episcopal chair, deploring to the
panic-stricken congregation the state of the city, the queen of the
world, desolated by famine, by pestilence, and by the Lombards, who at
that very moment were burning and plundering the villas and farms of
the surrounding Campagna.

CEMETERY AD CATACUMBAS.[163] The cemetery near the church of S.
Sebastiano was originally called in an indefinite way _cimiterium ad
catacumbas_. The etymology of the name is uncertain. De Rossi suggests
the roots _cata_, a Graeco-Latin preposition of the decadence,
signifying "near," and _cumba_, a resting-place. The word would
therefore mean _apud accubitoria_, "near the resting-places," an
allusion to the many tombs which surrounded the old crypt above and
below ground. This crypt dates from apostolic times, or, at all
events, from a period much earlier than the martyrdom of Sebastian,
the Christian officer whose name it now bears.

The great interest of the cemetery is derived from the shelter which
the bodies of the apostles are said to have had in its recesses during
the fiercest times of persecution. The temporary transferment of the
remains of SS. Peter and Paul, from their graves on the Via Cornelia
and the Via Ostiensis, to the catacombs, is not a mere tradition. It
is described by Pope Damasus in a metric inscription published by de
Rossi,[164] and by Pope Gregory in an epistle to the empress
Constantin