SABINA (Savina), Saint. - In early Christian hagiography the Bollandists have identified three anniversaries: 30 January, St. Sabina of Lodi, widow; 29 August, St. Sabina, widow and martyr of Vindena; 27 October, St. Sabina, martyr in Avila. Furthermore, a confusion between the masculine and feminine form of the name gave rise to a sister of St. Savinianus, celebrated on 29 January. A St. Sabina appears in the mosaic procession of the martyrs in Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna. In Rome the "titulus Sabinae" in its present form dates back to the early 5th century, but the name and the liturgical use of the building seem to predate the Basilica.
In the "Regio XII" and, probably, in the vicinity of the Basilica, the Notitia regionum urbis Romae records the presence of the "privata Hadriani," from which a "domus Sabinae" might have originated. The identification of this person with a venerated martyr is documented in the history of the "titulus" by the lid of the sarcophagus in which Pope Eugenius II (823) gathered with his own bones those of the martyrs of Nomentum; the person mentioned there is known from a legendary Passio of the 6th century and is part of the Sabina-Seraphia group, the first commemorated on 29 August and the second on 29 July. The Passio presents Seraphia as a native of Antioch (Syria), lodged by a Sabina, widow of Valentinus, an "illustrissimus vir," and daughter of Herod nicknamed Metallarius who, under the reign of Vespasian (69-79), had three times given games to the Romans. Both lived at Vindena. Seraphia converted Sabina, and she was condemned to beheading by the magistrate Berillus; she suffered martyrdom on 29 July. In her turn Sabina, summoned before the prefect Elpidius, was condemned and beheaded on 29 August and buried by the Christians of Vindena "ad arcum Faustini in monumento ipsius ubi ipsa venerabiliter reposuerat magistram fidei suae virginem Xii Serapiam." The city of Vindena, today vanished, was near Terni, probably at Rocca San Zenone. The hypothesis of G. P. Kirsch, concerning a colony of Vindenates on the Aventine, does not have sufficient support in the textual criticism of the Passio. It is better to admit a translation of the bodies of Seraphia and Sabina to Rome, between the time of the construction of the Basilica and the beginning of the 9th century.
The excavations carried out on various occasions and, above all, during the restorations of A. Muñoz (1914-19 and 1936-39), revealed: 1) the line of a vicus which from the 2nd to the 11th century was one of the main streets of the Aventine and which bounds the early Christian buildings to the northwest; 2) the existence of a quadriporticus transverse to the longitudinal axis of the 5th-century Basilica; 3) the presence of a bath building of the 4th century, beneath the quadriporticus. The excavations of 1914, at the entrance of the central nave, revealed, at 1.76 m below the present floor, the existence of a vast hall with a "podium" in the center; those of 1936-37 revealed another part of the same hall of notable dimensions. The investigations, still partial, have not made it possible to reconstruct the complete plan of this construction which, very probably, already in the 4th century served for Christian worship.
4) In the right nave, toward the apse, the 5th-century construction made use of a 4th-century wall with building elements of the 2nd century. From 1936 to 1939 buildings destined for the worship of a divinity were brought to light, which confirm the probability of the temple of Juno Regina.
The 5th-century Basilica, with three naves, reproduces the perfect type of the Christian basilica; erected under the pontificate of Celestine II (422-32) through the munificence of Peter of Illyria, a member of the Roman clergy, it was probably completed under Sixtus III (432-40), as appears from the dedicatory mosaic of the Basilica still preserved. Of the original decoration, much ruined, there remain wooden panels of the wooden door and, inside, along the nave, the decoration in "opus sectile," heavily restored. Inserted into the medieval fortifications of the northwest plateau of the Aventine in the 10th and 13th centuries, the Basilica was granted by Honorius III to the Order of Preachers, who still hold the office today.
