DOMITILLA, Cemetery of. - It is situated on the ancient via Ardeatina, which had its course further west than the present one. Today's entrance is on the via delle Sette Chiese.
The name of the cemetery is derived not from primitive indications, but from a late document known as the "Index of the cemeteries": "Coemeterium Domitillae Nerei et Achillei ad S. Petronillam via Ardeatina."
In fact, in the Cambrai codex of the Hieronymian Martyrology one reads "in cimiterio eorum," and in the biography of John I (523-26) it is said that the Pope "refecit cymiterium beatorum martyrum Nerei et Achillei."
The Passio relates that these two martyrs were buried in the "praedium Domitillae," whence the name of the cemetery in the cited Index. Two pagan inscriptions found in the area above recall donations of tombs "ex indulgentia Flaviae Domitillae" or "eius beneficio" (CIL, VI, 16426, 8942).
Two Flaviae Domitillae are known: one, the daughter of a sister of Titus and Domitian, wife of the consul Flavius Clemens (Dio Cassius, Hist. Rom., 67, 14; CIL, VI, 948); the other, according to Eusebius (Hist. eccl., III, 18, 4), the daughter of a sister of the consul Flavius Clemens, sent into exile on the island of Ponza, where later the widow Paula, at the end of the 4th century, still saw the place where D. "longum martyrium duxerat" (St. Jerome, Ep. 108 ad Eustoch.).
In the area above the cemetery, in the winter of 1926, adjacent to the ancient via Ardeatina, a pagan burial complex was found, consisting of columbaria and of "formae," some of them Christian as well, just as had been found in 1822 (O. Marucchi, Di un gruppo di antiche iscrizioni cristiane spettanti al cimitero di D. e recentemente acquistate dalla Commissione di archeologia sacra, in Nuovo bull. di arch. crist., 7 [1901], pp. 233-56). Beyond the area above, the cemetery extends for over 12 km. of galleries on two main levels, consisting of ancient autonomous nuclei later connected together.
One of the primitive nuclei which G. B. De Rossi (Del cristianesimo nella famiglia dei Flavi Augusti, e delle nuove scoperte nel cimitero di D., in Bullettino di arch. crist., 1st series, 2 [1865], pp. 17-24, 33-46, 89, 98), then Wilpert (Pitture, p. 121) and Marucchi (Roma sotterranea, new series, Monumenti del cimitero di D., I, Rome 1909, p. 92) considered to be the hypogeum of the Flavii and datable to the 1st century, is composed of an entrance adjacent to the via Ardeatina, with side rooms for gatherings, and originally of a single gallery cut into the living rock of the hill, containing niches for sarcophagi with fresco decoration: putti harvesting grapes on the vault, winged putti with garlands, landscapes and Christian scenes, such as Daniel among the lions, a fisherman with a hook, Noah. But there are no elements for attributing the hypogeum to the Flavii, nor is the dating earlier than the middle of the 2nd century (A. Schneider, Der Eingang zum Hypogaeum Flaviorum, in Mitteilungen des deutsch. archäolog. Instit., Römische Abteilung, 43 [1928], pp. 1-12).
Another ancient region is the one called by De Rossi that of the Flavii Aurelii; its access stairway was destroyed by the foundations of the left perimeter wall of the basilica. The surface of this region was limited and the owners were forced into successive lowerings, as at Callistus (v.); Styger distinguished six successive periods there; to the last of these belongs the cubiculum with the still intact tombs of a "C. Iulia Agrippina Simplici dulcia in aeternum," of a "P. Aelius Rufinus," of a "M. Aurelius Ianuarius" and of an "Annius Felix," none later than the middle of the 3rd century.
A third region with its own stairway and a hypogeum with niches for sarcophagi is not later than the 2nd half of the 3rd century. In it the martyrs remembered in the 4th century were placed in the "formae" cut into a cubiculum; the hypogeum was altered by the construction of a small basilica, oriented opposite to the present one, and subsequently occupied by the great building with three naves and a double order of columns (R. Krautheimer - W. Frankl, Recent discoveries in Churches in Rome, in American Journal of Archaeol., 43 [1939], pp. 397-98). The clearing of the basilica was begun by De Rossi in 1873 in the area purchased by Monsignor
F. S. De Merode to facilitate the excavations of the Pontifical Commission of Sacred Archaeology. De Rossi identified two fragments of the "Damasan poem" in honor of the martyrs Nereus and Achilleus, one of the columns of the ciborium with the scene of the martyrdom of the martyr Achilleus, and a series of inscriptions referring to the clergy of the titulus of Pasciola, situated near the Baths of Antoninus, on which the cemetery depended.
In a cubiculum adjacent to the basilica is represented the deceased Veneranda introduced into Paradise by the martyr Petronilla (Petronella martyr), G. B. De Rossi, Scoperta della basilica di S. Petronilla col sepolcro dei martiri Nereo e Achilleo nel cimitero di D., in Bull. di archeologia cristiana, 2nd series, 5 [1874], pp. 5-35; id., Scoperta dell'immagine a fresco di S. Petronilla nel cimitero di D., ibid., pp. 122-25; id., Sepolcro di S. Petronilla nella basilica in via Ardeatina e sua traslazione al Vaticano, ibid.,
3rd series, 3 [1878], pp. 125-46; and ibid., 4 [1879], pp. 5-20; id., Esame critico ed archeologico dell'epigrafe scritta sul sarcofago di S. Petronilla, ibid., pp. 139-60).
A fourth region is called that of the great stairway of Tor Marancia; it was cleared as early as 1854. The stairway originally led to a first level, then was enlarged and deepened to a great depth. There the crypt painted with the Good Shepherd was attributed by De Rossi and by Wilpert to the 1st century, whereas it is not earlier than the second half of the 3rd.
This region was in part visited by P. Ugonio and by A. Bosio as early as 1593 (Roma sotterranea, Rome 1632, p. 195); Bosio returned there several times and considered it the cemetery of St. Zephyrinus Segreto; once he feared he had lost his way there. It was also known to Boldetti, who detached the paintings of a cubiculum described and reproduced by Bosio in his Roma sotterranea and gave them to the Benedictine Father Scammacca, who brought them to his monastery of S. Niccolò in Catania, where they are preserved, altered by an unfortunate restoration (H. Achelis, Römische Katahombenbilder in Catania, Leipzig-Berlin 1932). To the first level belong: a fifth region called that of Ampliatus from the cubiculum with the inscription Ampliati discovered by De Rossi in 1881 (Il cubicolo di Ampliato nel cimitero di D., in Bull. d'arch. crist., 3rd series, 6 [1881], pp. 55-74, 123). It cannot, however, be dated to the 1st or the first half of the 2nd century (Wilpert, Pitture, p. 95, pls. 30-31, 1); it presents two successive decorations and is not earlier than the middle of the 3rd century. A sixth region of the 1st level is the one called that of the Six Saints, discovered in 1898-99; with polygonal cubicula and paintings of the 4th century; a seventh region known as early as the time of Bosio, also of the 4th century, is the one in which there is a series of arcosolia and painted cubicula, one of them with a double apse, with the representations of the Good Shepherd and of Jesus Christ among the twelve Apostles and a series of paintings identified by Wilpert as referring to the annona, that is, to the landing of grain (Ein unbehauntes Gemälde aus der Katakombe der hl. Domitilla und die cämeterialen Freshen mit Darstellungen aus dem realen Leben, in Römische Quartalschrift, 1 [1887], pp. 20-40). Near this region, painted between two loculi, is the image of the Epiphany with 4 magi (4th century). An eighth region with its own stairway descending to the second level is the one called that of 1897, with a series of very regular galleries. There is found the cubiculum of a presbyter Eulalius.
Boldetti also devastated a ninth region situated between the basilica and the hypogeum known as that of the Flavii. There he tried to detach the frescoes decorating the cubiculum of the fossor Diogenes, which he instead ruined. - See plates CXI-CXII.
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Enrico Jasi