STYGER, Paul. - Archaeologist, b. at Schwyz (Switzerland) on 27 Sept. 1889, d. at Lucerne on 14 May 1939. After six years of study at the Maria-Hill College in Schwyz, he entered in 1906 the Pontifical German-Hungarian College in Rome; ordained priest in 1913, he served as chaplain the same year at Santa Maria in Campo Santo and devoted himself to Christian archaeology.
His earliest studies were: *Neue Untersuchungen über die altchristlichen Petrusdarstellungen*, in Röm. Quartalschr., 27 (1913), pp. 17-74; *Die neuentdeckten mittelalterlichen Fresken von S. Croce in Gerusalemme*, ibid., 28 (1914), pp. 17-28; *Die Malereien in der Basilika des hl. Sabas auf dem Kl. Aventin*, ibid., pp. 49-96; *La Schola cantorum della chiesa di S. Saba*, in Studi romani, 2 (1914), pp. 224-28; *La decorazione a fresco del XII sec. della chiesa di S. Giovanni ante Portam Latinam*, ibid., pp. 261-328; *Die neuere Erforschung der altchristlichen Basiliken Roms und deren Wiederherstellung*, in Röm. Quartalschr., 29 (1915), pp. 3-25; *Die Christstatue im römischen Thermenmuseum*, ibid., pp. 27-28.
Monsignor Antonio De Waal entrusted him, together with D. O. Fasiolo, with the excavation he had begun on 16 March 1915 beneath the pavement of the basilica of San Sebastiano. Styger studied the entire complex with great diligence and announced his first findings in *Scavi a S. Sebastiano* (Röm. Quartalschr., 29 [1915], pp. 73-110); *Gli apostoli Pietro e Paolo ad Catacumbas sulla Via Appia* (ibid., pp. 149-205); then with a detailed report: *Il monumento apostolico della Via Appia* (Dissert. della Pont. accad. rom. di arch., 2a serie, XIII, 1 [1918], p. 1 ff.). After Monsignor De Waal’s death in 1917 and the suspension of the excavations at San Sebastiano, Styger returned to Switzerland. In 1919 he was called to the University of Warsaw to teach ecclesiastical history and archaeology, where he taught until 1932. He then published: *Die erste Ruhestätte der Apostelfürsten Petrus und Paulus an der Via Appia in Rom* (Zeitschr. für kath. Theol., 45 [1921], pp. 549-72); *Der heutige Stand und die künftige Aufgabe der christlichen Archaeologie* (Schweiz. Rundschau, 23 [1923], pp. 193-208); *Die altchristliche Grabeskunst* (Leipzig 1927), in which he argued that early Christian funerary art was simply narrative, a thesis immediately rejected by L. Lother, J. P. Kirsch, and many others. Through a series of acute analyses and deep examination of monuments he published: *L’origine delle cripte di Lucina* (Atti della Pont. accad. rom. di arch., Rend., 3a serie, 3 [1924-25], pp. 269-87); *L’origine del cimitero di S. Callisto sulla Via Appia* (ibid., 4 [1925-26], pp. 91-153), in which he argued that this cemetery was originally founded solely for the burial of the Roman clergy. *L’origine del cimitero di Domitilla sull’Ardeatina* (ibid., 5 [1928], pp. 89-144); *L’origine del cimitero di Priscilla sulla Via Salaria* (Lviv 1931). These preparatory studies served as the basis for his work: *Die römischen Katakomben* (Berlin 1933), in which he set out the topography of the principal Christian cemeteries of Rome, whose origins he sought to limit to the imperial *domus Caesaris*; Styger rightly corrected some of the datings proposed by G. B. De Rossi, O. Marucchi, and G. Wilpert. He also illustrated the crypts of the Roman martyrs in: *Die römischen Märtyrergrüfte* (Berlin 1935). His final published study was *Heidnische und Christliche Katakomben* (Pisciculi, Studien zur Religion und Kultur des Altertums, Münster in V. 1939, pp. 266-75). He was preparing a work on the history of early Christian art when he died.