Evening star., 1943-06-06

grown from one Greek and one
Latin word, and the meaning ap-
pears to be down tomb" The cata-
combs contain burial chambers far
under the surface of the ground.
Most catacombs were cut by menu
bers OF the early Christian church,
but some were made by others. Jew
1sh catacombs have been found In
Rome, and Moslem catacomb
exists near Taormina, on the island
OF Sicily. Alexandria, Egypt, also
has several catacombs.
Visited Catacombs.
Rome, however, Is the great CEN
ter of catacombs. Almost all of the
Christian catacombs there were cut
between the years 100 and 400. A
very early one is believed to date
back to y.
Six years ago, while 1 was in Italy,
visited the catacombs of St. Sebas-
tian. Although these are not the
largest of the catacombs around
Rome, they are looked upon as the
most important Two great figures
in Christian history, st. Peter and
st. Paul, are said to have been
buried there.
There were about 90 persons in
the party with which I went through
those catacombs. Each of us was
given thin candle about 6 inches
long, and We lighted the candles as
We entered the first dark tunnel. A
monk served as guide.
We walked in single file. but were
careful not to fall too far behind
the guide. BY taking the wrong
turn, person might become lost
from the others, and might find
it very hard to get back to the
upper world.
There are dozens of tunnels and
branch tunnels in the st. Sebastian
catacombs. We followed only a few
of them, but must have walked
about three-fourths of a mile. The
guide showed us the exact places
where Peter and Paul are believed
to have been buried.
Alongside the narrow tunnels are
hundreds of places where bodies of
the dead were laid to rest.
The catacombs of st. Callixtus
are larger than those of St. Sebas-
tian. They are the burial place Of
nine popes who lived more than
1900 years ago.
Large Rooms.
In preparing a catacomb, the
Christians first cut deep hole.
This hole might go down to depth
of from 30 to so feet. A stairway
was made so people could walk up
and down and tunnel was started
from one side of the hole. This
tunnel was likely to be from 10 to
Is feet high and from 8 to 10 feet
wide.
The main purpose of the cata-
combs was to serve as cemeteries,
but some of them contain large
underground rooms which were
used for church srevices. The early
Christians were looked upon as
dangerous people" by certain OF
the Roman Emperors because they
would not worship Jupiter. Juno,
Mars and other Roman gods.
WHICH q 1eOil1ll CAlpClO Vi CduCu
them enemies of the state. they
we're told that they could not meet
for prayers or church services
Many of the Christians secretly
made their way into catacombs and
followed their faith hidden away
from Roman soldiers.
One of the bitter enemies of the
Christians was the Emperor Nero.
During his reign, captured Chris
tians were forced to 60 into the
arena, where crowds could watch
them as they fell victims to wild
| beasts.
| After the fall of the Roman en-
pire Christians stopped cutting new
catacombs. The popes caused the
remains of some of the more famous
persons in catacombs to be removed
and buried elsewhere.
No one knows how many persons
were buried in the Roman cata-
combs, but the number was at least
100000 and perhaps much greater.
The length of all the catacombs
together has been estimated at be-
tween $50 and 300 miles.