This "arched monument," as it is technically termed, consists of a vaulted niche, containing a flat tomb projecting from the back wall: in some instances the roof is covered with painting. In subterranean chapels, it is not uncommon to find a tomb occupying part of the space originally covered by a fresco, in such a manner as to show that the grave is of later date than the picture. Occasionally these graves are accompanied by the cup, supposed to commemorate a martyr's death; and these cases have been adduced as proofs of the existence of church painting previous to the time of Constantine. But the uncertainty regarding the symbols of martyrdom, as well as the practice of secondary interment, destroy the value of the proof.

The projecting table formed by the lower part of the arched monument, and the horizontal grave exposed by the section on the right of the above

sketch, offer facilities for the celebration of martyrfeasts, which remove any difficulty occasioned by the perpendicular slabs of earlier times.

If we can suppose a chapel, like that represented above, to have been brought to its actual state of of decoration under the immediate successors of Constantine, it must be granted that the horizontal martyr-graves may have served as a scene of mutual exhortation in the persecutions under Julian and the Arian Emperors: that the faithful may have been strengthened in their arduous struggle, by the sacramental emblems, actually partaken of upon the grave-stone. But as a matter of history, this later recourse to the martyr-chapels is very different from the same expedient resorted to by the primitive confessors, objects of the Decian and Aurelian proscriptions; when the episcopal chair of Rome, not, as now, the throne of a temporal prince, was but one remove from a martyr's crown.

The vaulted monument of the last chapel, though a great refinement upon the simple niche, was but the embryo of the fully developed confession of the next age. In the cancellarium here engraved, may be traced the elements of the modern chancel, balustrade, and communion table, of our own churches: or the semicircular round-headed tribune,* the barred gates of the crypt, and the altar, of modern Italy. A sarcophagus, containing bones, is seen

* The baldacchino is not here specified, on the supposition that it is only a substitute for the tribune, in situations where the high altar is removed from its natural place.

broken. A cup is placed upon the pedestal on the right.

A short time before the introduction of Christianity, the Imperial palaces of Rome had been provided with courts appropriated to the administration of justice. These basilicæ, as they were termed, increased to the number of eighteen, and were afterwards devoted to the transaction of general business. Their interior displayed a central avenue, flanked by two lateral aisles, and terminated by a transept. The male and female candidates for justice filled the aisles, the separation of the sexes being preserved by the central

nave.* There was also a semicircular swelling of the transept opposite to the nave, occupied by the judge and his officers: to this recess was given the name of Absis, in Greek, and Tribuna, in Latin; the last derived from the ancient office of Tribune, and furnishing the original of the modern appellation, Tribunal.

The transept of the Imperial Basilica was raised a few steps higher than the nave; and the seats for magistrates, sometimes disposed in a semicircular form, were rather above both. It requires no great stretch of imagination to trace in this arrangement the outline of a Christian church: the building, originally intended for the protection of right, and the enforcement of justice, was naturally applied to the preaching of eternal truth and righteousness: and its name, Basilica, a kingly hall, was well suited to the temple of the King of kings. "The bishop," observes Hope, "might find in the raised absis his fit seat, called upon, as he was, to over-see his flock, and the clergy who were ranged on either side." But what seemed most of all to warrant the appropriation of the building, was the discovery, made at the time, that the transept and nave of the heathen edifice formed a cross, and had through past ages uttered a mute prophecy of the future triumph of the Crucified. It is said that many of the Pagans were profoundly impressed with this coincidence, and disposed thereby to

* See on this subject excellent articles in Bunsen's Rome, and in Hope's Essays on Architecture.

receive Christianity. Nor is the fact less probable than that which is related of the Alexandrians, that on the destruction of the Serapion, and revelation of its mysteries, many changed their religion in consequence of finding the cross prominently displayed among the Egyptian symbols: such trifles have weight with superstitious minds.

The building, once devoted to the purposes of Christian worship, left little scope for the talents of its new professors in the way of alteration. To transfer to the absis the hallowed associations of the monumentum arcuatum; to partition off part of the nave for a choir; to roof over the central aisle for the convenience of worshippers, and to erect pulpits in places whence the voice could reach every part of the audience,-taxed but lightly the feeble invention of the fourth century. The entire edifice, somewhat resembling a magnificent barn, bore no manner of similitude to the Pagan temple bare walls without, in place of columns; a flat wooden roof and regular windows, in the room of an unbroken enclosure favourable to the artifices of divination: these peculiarities must have obviated every objection to the secular origin of the building that the most uncompromising enemies of idolatry could suggest.

We may safely take as a specimen of church architecture belonging to the times of the Catacombs, the basilica sculptured on a sarcophagus, actually discovered in them, and now deposited in the Vatican library.