CORPI SANTI. — This term refers to bodies that were exhumed from ancient cemeteries and venerated as relics of previously unknown martyrs. This practice began in the 4th century, flourished especially in the 9th century, and reached its peak in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was driven by the faithful’s fervent desire to possess martyr relics and fueled by the belief that ancient Christian burial grounds, particularly the Roman catacombs, were essentially cemeteries of martyrs.
In the 4th and 5th centuries, there are frequent accounts of pious women, monks, and ecclesiastics traveling to spread relics of previously unknown martyrs. Many discoveries of martyrs from this period, especially in Palestine, and of 1st-century Christian martyrs, are not without historical suspicion and difficulty.
In the 9th century, under the influence of Charlemagne and the abbots of the principal monasteries of his empire, an intense movement arose to obtain relics of the most famous Roman martyrs from Rome. However, instead of these, bodies of previously unknown martyrs were sometimes taken from outside the city, or even names were falsified to satisfy the desires of those requesting them. A deacon named Deusdona is known to have been guilty of this sacrilegious trafficking.
Toward the end of the 16th century, the Roman catacombs were rediscovered, and in the fervor of the Counter-Reformation, the first thing sought within them were the bodies of martyrs believed to fill them. Some indiscriminately took possession of any corpse they encountered, while others looked for signs they considered indicative of martyrdom, such as the palm branch, the Constantinian monogram, the ampulla (v.) thought to contain blood, or certain phrases in inscriptions. In this way, many popes granted licenses to extract from the catacombs, at one’s own discretion, bodies of previously unknown martyrs or those only vaguely identified with famous Roman martyrs, to be distributed to various churches for veneration.
Following abuses and protests from many quarters, Pope Clement IX established a special Congregation to regulate this matter. On April 10, 1668, it decreed that the signs sufficient to prove martyrdom were the palm branch and vases containing their blood found above the tombs of the deceased. Shortly afterward, the Pope decreed that from then on, the search, extraction, and distribution of these bodies of martyrs should be carried out solely by the Cardinal Vicar and the Papal Sacristan.
In this way, for about two centuries, until the mid-19th century, countless *corpi santi* were extracted from the Roman catacombs and other ancient burial grounds outside Rome (such as at Cagliari, Pompeii, and near Nancy) and venerated as previously unknown martyrs, sometimes even anonymous ones given new names. The two signs mentioned above primarily served as evidence of martyrdom, but many others (such as the cross, the monogram, etc.) were also used, even though they had never been expressly disapproved. Almost every church in Christendom received some, and certain ones, especially those of princes or religious orders, had them in great abundance (cf., for example, A. M. Zaccaria, *Monologium sanctorum quorum reliquiae in Cremonensi PP. Societatis Iesu ecclesia adversantur*, in appendix to *Cremonensium episcoporum series*, Milan 1749, pp. 190 ff., 239). At first, to lend greater authority to these practices, even outright forgeries were created, particularly of inscriptions intended to attest to the relics in circulation. Many of these came from Abbot Giacomo Crescenzi of Sant’Equizio in Norcia.
Nevertheless, learned and prudent men were never lacking who protested or at least expressed reservations about the methods used in the extraction and identification of these *corpi santi*. Among them were Papebroch, Mabillon, Di Costanzo, de Buck, Le Blant, and finally De Rossi, who succeeded in practically ending this trade by the mid-19th century, when the *Commissione di archeologia sacra* was established to oversee the catacombs, in which the voices of De Rossi and Fr. Marchi were always heeded. Pius X had the *corpo santo* of a woman named Fortissima, brought to the basilica of San Marco in the 18th century, reinterred in the catacombs.
CURRENT PRACTICE OF THE SACRED CONGREGATION OF RITES. — The Sacred Congregation of Rites, having established that it is now absolutely certain that no bodies of known martyrs remained in the catacombs after the 8th century—since these had been transferred from the outskirts into the interior of Rome to save them from the profanation of the Lombard soldiers—has, for about forty years, consistently denied requests for feasts with an Office and Mass in honor of alleged saints whose remains, recently extracted from the catacombs and venerated in various places (even when authenticated by the Cardinal Vicars or Papal Sacristans), have been refused. The Congregation has advised that this cult, even in private, be prudently discontinued, and that the relics be removed from veneration and, if possible, replaced with others that are certainly authentic.
It may also be noted that even in past centuries, when historical studies had not advanced to their present level, the Sacred Congregation did not grant an Office and Mass in honor of alleged saints not recorded in the *Martyrologium Romanum* or whose relics’ identity and authenticity were not established, although it did not prohibit their veneration (cf. *Decretum generale* of October 19, 1691; for others: *Decreta authentica Congregationis Sacrorum Rituum*, I, Rome 1898, no. 1853). Alfonso Carinci