Rome / Roma - Basilica of St. Clement - excavations, Temple of Mitras - postcard

Postcard
• Picture / Image:  Roma - Basilica di S. Clemente - Scavi, Tempio di Mitra / Rome - Basilica of St. Clement, excavations - Temple of Mithras
• Publisher: Basilica di San Clemente 
• Postally used:  no
• Stamp:  n/a
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• Notes / condition: 

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Text from the free encyclopedia WIKIPEDIA may appear below to give a little background information (internal links may not  work) :

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The Basilica of Saint Clement (Italian: Basilica di San Clemente al Laterano) is a Roman Catholic minor basilica dedicated to Pope Clement I located in Rome, Italy. Archaeologically speaking, the structure is a three-tiered complex of buildings: (1) the present basilica built just before the year 1100 during the height of the Middle Ages; (2) beneath the present basilica is a 4th century basilica that had been converted out of the home of a Roman nobleman, part of which had in the 1st century briefly served as an early church, and the basement of which had in the 2nd century briefly served as a mithraeum; (3) the home of the Roman nobleman had been built on the foundations of a republican era building that had been destroyed in the Great Fire of 64AD.

This ancient church was transformed over the centuries from a private home that was the site of clandestine Christian worship in the 1st century to a grand public basilica by the 6th century, reflecting the emerging Catholic Church's growing legitimacy and power. The archaeological traces of the basilica's history were discovered in the 1860s by Joseph Mullooly.^[1] lector in Sacred Theology beginning in 1849 at the College of Saint Thomas in Rome, the future Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum.^[2]

The lowest levels of the present basilica are remnants of the foundation of a republican era building that was destroyed in the Great Fire of 64. An industrial building, possibly the imperial mint of Rome, was built on the site during the Flavian period and shortly thereafter a domus, or multi-level house alongside it, separated form the industrial building by a narrow alleyway. About a hundred years later (c. 200), the central room of the domus was remodelled for use as part of a mithraeum, that is, as part of a sanctuary of the cult of Mithras. The main cult room (the speleum, ""cave"",^[3] which is about 9.6m long and 6m wide, was discovered in 1867 but could not be investigated until 1914 due to lack of drainage.^[4] The exedra, the shallow apse at the far end of the low vaulted space, was trimmed with pumice to render it more cave-like.

Central to the main room of the sanctuary was found an altar, in the shape of a sarcophagus, and with the main cult relief of the tauroctony, Mithras slaying a bull, on its front face.^[5] The torchbearers Cautes and Cautopates appear on respectively the left and right faces of the same monument. A dedicatory inscription identifies the donor as one pater Cnaeus Arrius Claudianus, perhaps of the same clan as Titus Arrius Antoninus' mother. Other monuments discovered in the sanctuary include a bust of Sol^[6] kept in the sanctuary in a niche near the entrance, and a figure of Mithras petra generix,^[7] i.e. Mithras born of the rock. Fragments of statuary of the two torch bearers were also found .^[8] One of the rooms adjoining the main chamber has two oblong brickwork enclosures,^[9] one of which was used as a ritual refuse pit for remnants of the cult meal. All three monuments mentioned above are still on display in the mithraeum. A fourth monument, – a statue of St. Peter found in the speleum's vestibule and still on display there – is not of the mysteries.

At some time in the 4th century, the lower level of the industrial building was filled in with dirt and rubble and its second floor remodeled. An apse was built out over part of the domus, whose lowest floor, with the Mithraeum, was also filled in. This ""first basilica"" is known to have existed in 392, when St. Jerome wrote of the church dedicated to St. Clement, i.e. Pope Clement I, a 1st century AD Christian convert and considered by patrologists and ecclesiastical historians to be identical with Titus Flavius Clemens. Restorations were undertaken in the 9th century and ca 1080-99.^[10]

Over the next several centuries, San Clemente became a beacon for church artists and sculptors, benefitting from Imperial largesse.

The early basilica was the site of councils presided over by Pope Zosimus (417) and Symmachus (499). The last major event that took place in the lower basilica was the election in 1099 of Cardinal Rainerius of St Clemente as Pope Paschal II.

type=printed postcards

theme=topographical: rest of the world

sub-theme=europe

county/ country=italy

number of items=single

period=1945 - present

postage condition=unposted