Splitting the Core: The Transverse Wall at the Basilica of San Paolo in Rome

MAAR 58, 2013

SPLITTING THE CORE:

THE TRANSVERSE WALL AT

THE BASILICA OF SAN PAOLO IN ROME

Nicola Camerlenghi, Dartmouth College

Along the banks of the Tiber River, 2.33 kilometers south of the walls of Rome, lies the Basilica of San Paolo fuori le Mura. For many contemporary visitors arriving through Leonardo da

Vinci Airport, San Paolo is the first monumental building they encounter approaching the Eternal City and the last to bid them farewell upon departure. As the principal church dedicated to St. Paul, the basilica remains one of Christianity’s most important sites and, along with St. Peter’s, the principal pilgrimage destination in Rome. Commissioned in a.d. 386 to enshrine the relics of the apostle, San Paolo was the last great imperially sponsored basilica constructed in Rome (figs. 1–2). Through the centuries, the basilica benefited from the generous support of emperors, kings, popes, and the monastic community that lived in proximity to the basilica, who together comprised the most elite of possible patrons. In July 1823, a fire destroyed much of the building and instigated a vast reconstruction that resulted in the current structure, which was reconsecrated in 1855. During its long history, the basilica underwent numerous transformations, which in varying degrees altered its use, appearance, and meaning. In this article I consider a major transformation, which took place sometime between 1130 and 1143, when a massive wall was inserted across the transept, effectively splitting the liturgical, devotional, and symbolic core of the basilica. This transverse wall remained in place for the next seven centuries and even survived the catastrophic fire largely intact. Stretching the length of the transept (71 m) and rising to its full height (29 m), this wall (figs. 2–4) was composed of brick and spoliated marble, the latter of which was used for the architectural members. Materi-als sufficient to build a medium-sized church in medieval Rome were employed.1 From its earliest scholarly mention in Nicola Maria Nicolai’s monograph on San Paolo of 1815, the transverse wall at San Paolo has been described as a medieval addition, grafted onto the original early Christian building.2 In 1826, following the fire and on the eve of the nineteenth-century reconstruction, the wall was demolished in an effort to restore the layout of the basilica to its pristine original state. Its destruction consigned not only the wall itself, but also the memory of its historical and liturgical function over the intervening centuries, to oblivion. Indeed, the few modern scholars who men-tion the transverse wall at all refer to it as a merely structural intervention, intended to subdivide the massive 24-m-wide transept and facilitate its reroofing, thus ensuring the continued practical use of the space.3 Although the structural impetus for the construction of the transverse wall is

I am grateful for the comments of the anonymous readers who reviewed this article and to Justin Walsh, Richard Sundt, Alison Locke Perchuk, and Brian Curran for their suggestions.

1 At its lower level, the transverse wall included column shafts of gray granite, cipollino, and red granite. The northern and southern flanks measured 27 m each and the central arch spanned 15 m. For a detailed description of the columns

and their sizes, see Nicolai 1815, 303 and 307.

2 Nicolai 1815, 307.

3 For brief mentions of the transverse wall, see Kirschbaum 1959, 192; Krautheimer 1937–1977, 5:101–105, 164–169; de Blaauw and Filippi 2001, 18; Kessler 2004, 19; and Docci 2006, 76–78.

NICOLA CAMERLENGHI116

undeniable, it provides only a partial explanation for the project as a whole. Could something so vast, so attentively ornamented, and so centrally located around the basilica’s core really have been conceived solely as a solution to the problem of roofing this most important of liturgical spaces?

In this article, I posit that from its inception to shortly before its demolition, the transverse wall at San Paolo simultaneously facilitated roof repairs, provided a formidable setting for evolving liturgical and devotional functions, and visually affirmed the papacy’s claim to spiritual authority. I shall begin with the structural impetus that inspired the construction by pointing to the difficulty of obtaining adequately sized timber for the task of roofing some of Rome’s largest basilicas during the Middle Ages. In addition to these structural factors, I shall also discuss a number of functional considerations that account for the wall’s appearance and its role in splitting the transept into areas that could be dedicated to liturgy and devotion. From there, I will move to an examination of how the transverse wall functioned symbolically to assert the papacy’s claim to spiritual authority by enhancing the apostolic tomb and the adjacent pontifical throne. In my reassessment of the wall’s patronage, I credit antipope Anacletus II (1130–1138) with the initial construction rather than his contemporary Innocent II (1130–1143), who is cited as the patron in what turn out to be problematic sources. But the moment of inception of the transverse wall is only part of the story, and I conclude my study by tracing the wall’s overall impact on, and evolving importance to, the basilica from the time of its construction to its demolition. As we shall see, over the course of time, the initial splitting of the core unleashed a chain of subsequent transformations, which insured the transverse wall’s relevance and secured its capacity to anchor meaning within the basilica for centuries.

Fig. 1. Giovanni Paolo Panini, interior of San Paolo fuori le Mura, looking toward the altar (Private Collection, photo © Christie's Images, The Bridgeman Art Library).

Fig. 2. Pietro Ruga, plan of San Paolo based on a survey by Andrea Alippi (Nicolai 1815, pl. 1).

Fig. 3. Antonio Acquaroni, view of the transept with a portion of the transverse wall in the foreground (1823) (private collection).

Fig. 4. Pietro Ruga, section through the transept based on a survey by Andrea Alippi and Carlo Ruspi (Nicolai 1815, pl. 4).

SPLITTING THE CORE 119

1

San Paolo’s transept—along with its nave and the nave of St. Peter’s—was one of the widest roof spans in Rome and was also among the widest built anywhere up to that time. The clear width of 24 m meant that any renovation required a major financial and technical effort, especially if beams were to be replaced rather than just restored or strengthened.4 The Roman scholar Nicola Maria Nicolai (1756–1833), writing just a few years before the fateful fire, was the first to propose that the transverse wall had permitted the use of two approximately 12 m beams (placed end to end) in order to span the transept.5 Although this purported “two-beam scheme” is not specifically depicted in views of the transverse wall, Nicolai’s supposition is a plausible one. The absence of depictions of that detail may be ascribed to a general disinterest in the technical aspect of the structure or, perhaps, to the difficulty of assessing the structural system from the wall head (fig. 5).6 Nicolai’s hypothesis gains credence when we consider a similar wall, of somewhat uncertain date, that used to bisect the nave in the Basilica of Santi Cosma e Damiano in the Roman Forum (see fig. 6, which does not depict the roof members). This wall’s elevation, reconstructed by Biasiotti and Whitehead on the basis of period descriptions, was supported by columns and lightened in the upper story by arched openings, as at San Paolo.7 Largely on the basis of its structural purpose and appearance—which are akin to its counterpart at San Paolo—scholars have dated this transverse structure to around the middle of the twelfth century. While the earlier roof at Santi Cosma e Damiano spanned the ancient hall’s not inconsiderable 18.5 m width, the addition of a transverse wall permitted the use of pairs of shorter beams.

4 An alternative structural solution might have been to splice or scarf two or more beams together to make a longer member, but it is unlikely these techniques were practiced in Rome at the time. See Valeriani 2006 and Mark 1993, 205.

5 Nicolai 1815, 307.

6 Views by Létarouilly (fig. 5) and by Rondelet (1867, pl. cxiv) do not necessarily represent the roofing system adopted in the twelfth century, given that portions of the roof of San Paolo were renovated a dozen times between the construction and

demolition of the transverse wall. These myriad renovations and their importance for the history of roofing technology are treated in Camerlenghi 2011, 264–267.

7 Tucci 2004, 103. In this study, Tucci examines a drawing by Pirro Ligorio and a description by Onofrio Panvinio, which together offer evidence for the no-longer-extant wall. See also the reconstruction by Biasiotti and Whitehead 1924, where the transverse wall at Santi Cosma e Damiano appears to have shifted the original orientation of the trabeation by 90 degrees.

Fig. 5. Assorted views of roofing elements, including a portion of the sixteenth-century suspended ceiling (from Létarouilly 1823, 3:pl. 336).

Fig. 6. Transverse wall in the Roman Basilica of Santi Cosma e Damiano (from Biasiotti and Whitehead 1924, fig. 39).


It is possible that roofing challenges similar to those at San Paolo and Santi Cosma e Damiano played a part in two contemporary transformations at the Roman churches of Santa Croce in Geru-salemme and Sant’Adriano al Foro. The first was built around a.d. 200 as an imperial audience hall 22 m wide but was repartitioned during the 1130s and 1140s into a tripartite scheme comprised of a central nave that was 10 m wide, with a pair of 5-m-wide side aisles (fig. 7).8 Similarly, at the start of the twelfth century, the former Roman Senate House, which had long since become the church of Sant’Adriano al Foro, was divided into a more feasibly roofed space encompassing a nave and flanking side aisles that were 8.8 m and 3.3 m wide, respectively (fig. 8).9 The repartitioning of these buildings points to the cumbersome legacy of vast, imperial spaces that antiquity bequeathed to medieval Romans. But surely, other social and liturgical concerns were at play, including a desire to make these converted spaces conform more closely to the Roman aisled-basilica type.10 But such claims cannot be made for San Paolo, which had been constructed as a basilican church in the first place. Indeed, the addition of the transverse wall in San Paolo served only to distinguish it—from a purely formal point of view—from the Roman aisled-basilica type it otherwise exemplified.

Another transverse wall, comparable to the one at San Paolo, may still be seen crossing the central drum of Santo Stefano Rotondo on the Caelian hill (fig. 9). Several features of this wall, including its tripartite organization, arcades, and arched openings, echo the form of the transverse wall at San Paolo. Textual evidence from the Liber Pontificalis, a compilation of papal biographies particularly rich with accounts of patronage, suggests that the structures are in fact contemporary, although they served slightly different purposes.11 At Santo Stefano, the transverse wall was erected in response to the

8 For the repartitioning at Santa Croce, see Biasiotti and Pesarini 1913, 260; Varagnoli 1995, 22; and Cecchelli 2004.

9 For the repartitioning at Sant’Adriano, see Cecchelli 1959; Bartoli 1963; and Mancini 1968, 191.

10 It is beyond the scope of this article to account for this

group of transformations in detail, but the topic might benefit from further elucidation along structural, liturgical, and social lines.

11 Liber Pontificalis 2:384. Two significant contributions to the study of Santo Stefano include Ceschi 1982 and Brandenburg 1998. Palumbo suggested that Santo Stefano was damaged

Fig. 7 (near right). Giovanni Ciampini, plan of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme

(from Vetera Monimenta … [1690] 1:pl. 4;

University of Oregon Libraries).

Fig. 8 (far right). A. Bartoli, plan of Sant’Adriano al Foro

(from Bartoli 1963).


centralized format of the vast interior space, which measured 22 m in diameter. At its highest elevation, above the current wooden ceiling, the wall provided a central point to support the radiating wooden beams of the roof. The problem of building a conical roof did not concern the builders at San Paolo.

Whether or not the transformations examined above can be ascribed to a family of interventions (or even to a family of builders) remains an open question, one that falls, unfortunately, beyond the scope of this particular study. Although the timber requirements of other Roman churches fell short of those at San Paolo or St. Peter’s, these other transformations may have been conditioned—at least in part—by the challenges associated with covering vast interior spans. The immense timbers required to reroof the transept of San Paolo would have been hard to procure in any period, but the evidence presented from multiple structures in Rome suggests that they were especially difficult to procure during the first half of the twelfth century. One possible reason for this scarcity is the fact that, during the early twelfth century, the region of Calabria, where Roman (and presumably other) patrons had traditionally turned for supplies of large timber, came under the domination of the Normans. Given the material requirements for such large-scale projects as the Basilica of San Nicola in Bari, the Cathedral of Monreale, and the Palatine Chapel in Palermo, it is possible that the Normans took measures to divert or safeguard the supply of precious old-growth timbers of the sort needed for large-scale roofing jobs. That said, the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere, with a 16-m-wide nave, was able to be constructed ex novo concurrently with the aforementioned interventions in Rome and across southern Italy. From this, we may conclude that, while a shortage of timbers cannot be accepted as the sole impetus behind all of these Roman projects, it may be reasonable to propose that the transverse wall at San Paolo might not have been built as it was if long timbers had been plentiful.

during the schism of 1130–1138 and thus required repairs that were probably undertaken by Pope Innocent II. See Palumbo 1995, 232.

Fig. 9. Santo Stefano Rotondo, transverse wall, Caelian hill, Rome (photo Robert Glass).


2

Structural factors alone, however, are rarely sufficient to explain the solutions adopted in a build-ing, since design is a process that fuses a multiplicity of desires and demands into a single solution. When confronting a plethora of factors, designers, then and now, adopt solutions to satisfy those they consider most important. As we shall see, the cases discussed above also suggest that parceling church interiors, even radically, was not necessarily antithetical to other demands. On the contrary, functional demands may have been among the major motivating priorities for sectioning the interiors. Speaking generally, regular and timely renovations to a roof secured the proper functioning of a building and the protection of the interior space; as a result, these count among the most frequent and important types of transformations.

Through attentive design decisions and material selection, it is evident that the twelfth-century builders of the transverse wall at San Paolo took pains to harmonize their addition with the extant fabric of the basilica. The central arch flanked by two pierced walls (see fig. 4) created a tripartite scheme that echoed the subdivisions apparent in the nave and side aisles, and also those found within the transept itself. Probably to expedite construction, the brickwork of the transverse wall was not toothed into the preexisting transept—the two structures were largely independent of each other. Nonetheless, the central windows that had been part of the northern and southern transept since the basilica’s inception were blocked by the addition and thus completely walled in (fig. 10).12 A pair of monolithic red granite columns supported the central arch of the transverse wall, while two grayish-white Thasian marble columns supported the preexisting triumphal arch separating the nave from the transept (see fig. 3). These four columns were linked by a horizontal plaster molding

Fig. 10. Giovanni Ciampini, view of San Paolo’s exterior from the north with enclosed transept windows (Vetera Monimenta . . . [1690] 1:pl. 7; University of Oregon Libraries).

12 I have not identified any historical depictions of the south-ern transept wall, but it is virtually certain that the central window was enclosed at the same time as that to the north.

Some evidence for these windows is provided by Krautheimer 1937–1977, 5:124–127.


that wrapped around the transept and transverse wall. Although the molding visible in the surviv-ing views may be an eighteenth-century restoration, the fact that it was continuous implies that great efforts were made to select spoliated elements such as columns, bases, capitals, and sculpted architraves whose elevation would add up—with uncanny precision—to the height of the preexist-ing Ionic columns of the triumphal arch. In other words, far from being a haphazard construction project, this was a carefully calculated, sensitive transformation of the existing transept. To further reduce its footprint, the transverse wall was a sturdy 70 cm thick at ground level, and the choice was made to bolster only structurally critical points, such as the spandrels of the central arch and the abutment to the transept walls. Likewise, in the pair of wall segments flanking the central arch, the dead weight of the structure was diminished thanks to a variety of perforations, including four arcades below and six arched openings above. In sum, the tripartite scheme, thin and perforated walls, and the horizontal molding favored by the homogenous heights of the columnar supports minimized the disturbance that the transverse wall might otherwise have caused, facilitating the introduction of a potentially incongruous addition to the transept.

From its inception, this transverse wall split the transept into two parallel and adjacent parts. Evidence for this subdivision is found in a pair of sixteenth-century drawings (figs. 11–12), made by the Augustinian scholar Onofrio Panvinio (d. 1568). These drawings, which provided visual annotations for his subsequent publications, display Panvinio’s keen interest in the arrangement of the basilica’s altars and liturgical furniture. For modern-day scholars, the drawings provide an invaluable resource, allowing us to comprehend the effects that the transverse wall had on liturgy and veneration. The western sector of the transept, closer to the nave, included the platform of a vast (approximately 10 × 12 m) presbytery, which was raised above the surrounding transept floor. Its rectangular shape and the apsidiole protruding from the eastern side of the presbytery were out-lined by twenty columns rising above a parapet.13 Most of these columns were made of porphyry—a precious purple stone mined in Egypt in Roman imperial times, whose color and extreme hardness bore associations with power and sanctity.14

The form, if not the very materials, that the presbytery displayed during Panvinio’s time were already present at the time of the transverse wall’s construction. Probably from the time of Pope Gregory the Great (590–604), and surely by the time of Leo III (795–816), a papal throne stood at the center of the transept within the presbytery.15 In his 1570 guide to the principal pilgrimage churches in Rome, Panvinio observed: “Under the triumphal arch in the middle of the transept, which it crosses, is the marble presbytery and the pontifical throne made by Leo III. In the middle of the presbytery is the main altar of Saints Peter and Paul.”16 Indeed, Panvinio’s sketches depict the throne at the apex of the apsidiole (figs. 11–12). It is also likely that there were benches (subsellia), for the use of the papal entourage, flanking the throne and along the inside wall of the parapet, but Panvinio makes no mention of them. The throne presented the pope to the faithful during his visits to San Paolo and represented him during his absence. As recounted in the text accompanying Panvinio’s drawings, three steps linked the throne to the platform of the presbytery; in turn, the

13 According to Santi Pesarini, the columns were arranged in the following manner: six toward the nave, five for each side, and eight for the rear, which included the apsidiole with the throne. Note, however, that the corner columns are counted twice. See Pesarini 1913, 410.

14 On the role of porphyry, see the essays in del Bufalo 2012.

15 For the evidence regarding the early appearance of the presbytery, see Pesarini 1913, 421; Tolotti 1983, 99; de Blaauw and Filippi 2001, 20; and de Blaauw 2009b.

16 The original text is: “Nel mezzo della croce, che attraversa, sotto l’arco più grande della chiesa, è il coro di marmo, e la sedia Pontificale, fatta da Leone III. In mezzo del coro è l’altar maggiore di S. Pietro e di S. Paolo.” Panvinio 1570, 94.

Fig. 11. Onofrio Panvinio, first sketch of the liturgical arrangement in the transept, ca. 1560 (Cod. Vat. Lat. 6781, fol. 417, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City) (photo Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana).

Fig. 12. Onofrio Panvinio, second sketch of the liturgical arrangement in the transept, ca. 1560 (Cod. Vat. Lat. 6781, fol. 418, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City) (photo Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana).


presbytery was elevated four steps above the transept floor, which was itself raised above the nave.17 Thanks to these successive elevations, the visibility of the throne and thus of its occupant was greatly enhanced. For most viewers in the basilica, the central arch of the transverse wall crowned or, at the very least, visually framed the papal throne (fig. 13).

The presbytery also enclosed the main altar, which was placed directly above the apostolic relics. The pope alone officiated here, an honor he shared only in the thirteenth century, and even then under extraordinary circumstances.18 Crowning the marble altar was a ciborium, which at the time of the transverse wall’s construction was not yet the one elegantly sculpted by Arnolfo di Cambio in 1285.19 The actual appearance of the altar and ciborium around the mid-twelfth century is unknown, but their existence and importance are testified by the many transformations that they underwent.20

Following the construction of the transverse wall, the presbytery subdivided the western sec-tor of the transept into a northern and southern branch. As a result, circulation from one branch to the other—when necessary—would have required passing underneath the transverse wall. In Panvinio’s drawings of the 1560s, the presbytery opened onto the southern branch of the western sector of the transept. This opening aligned with a marble carpet of six quincunx shapes that is known from later depictions of the transept (see fig. 2). Though the floor ornamentation was of the Cosmatesque type common to central Italy during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, little more can be said about its relation to the transverse wall and the transept. Assuming that the floor is in its original position, it may have marked a processional route between the presbytery and the sacristy or the adjacent monastery—both of which were just south of the transept. The presence of such an important decorative—and potentially liturgical—feature, combined with the presbytery, altar, and papal throne, confirms that the western sector of the transept was the principal liturgical area of the basilica, and thus the focus of the entire building. Because the western half of the transept also provided access to its eastern counterpart, it must have been a major site of circulation for priests processing during the Liturgy of the Eucharist, for monks walking to Divine Offices, and especially for pilgrims who entered the building through the nave and circulated to the transept to venerate the relics.21

While the western sector catered to liturgy and circulation, the eastern part, which was closer to the apse, provided access to the major devotional spots, which were located in two distinct crypts beneath the transept and within the apse. The entrance to the crypt below the main altar was located at the precise center of the transept at a point that—after the transverse wall was built—stood below

17 Panvinio 1560, 47.

18 Although since Pope Gregory VII’s bull of ca. 1070 priests could celebrate the Eucharist at San Paolo with the consent of the abbot of the adjacent monastery, celebration of the Mass at the main altar remained the sole prerogative of the pope. A bull of Pope Honorius III (1216–1227) gave the abbot of San Paolo permission to use a miter and ring, symbols of the bishopric. With these insignia (and only if he had been ordained by a pope) the abbot could be permitted to conduct Mass on the main altar. Since it would have been rare for an abbot to be ordained by the pope, Abbot Giacomo requested permission from Boniface VIII (1294–1303) to celebrate the Eucharist at the altar unconditionally on the feast day of Paul’s Conversion (25 January). Boniface granted this permission in a bull of 12 December 1301. Under Benedict XIV (1740–1758), a member of the College of Bishops was granted permission to celebrate Mass at the main altar also

on 30 June to commemorate the feast day of Saints Peter and Paul. See Severano 1630, 405 and Schuster 1934, 108.

19 De Blaauw 2009a.

20 Some earlier interventions to the main altar have been ascribed to Leo the Great (440–461)—see de Blaauw and Filippi 2001, 17–19; Gregory Great (590–604)—see Liber Pontificalis 1:310; Hadrian I (772–795)—see Liber Pontificalis 1:512; Gregory IV (827–844)—see Liber Pontificalis 2:77; Leo IV (847–855)—see Liber Pontificalis 2:130, Augenti 1991.

21 A secondary entrance directly from the Via Ostiense is first documented in Giovanni Colonna da Tivoli’s drawn survey of San Paolo (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Cod. Vat. Lat. 7721, fol. 83v), which dates to 1554. For more on this entrance, see Camerlenghi 2009, esp. 386.


the apex of that wall’s central arch (figs. 13–14). In his drawings, Panvinio indicates a series of steps that led below the raised presbytery and thus below the floor of the transept to a crypt, where the apostolic relics were venerated. Further to the east, along the chord of the apse, a shorter flight of stairs led to a space that, in the latter half of the sixteenth century, was called the “Oratory of St. Julian.”22 This contained the relics of Saints Julian, Celsus, Basilissa, and Marcionilla but is only briefly described by Panvinio.23 In the apse itself, veneration and minor liturgies took place at the tomb of St. Timothy, a fourth-century martyr from Antioch, and at another containing relics of the Holy Innocents, killed during Herod’s massacre.24

By framing the major liturgical celebrations in the western sector and offering access to centers of devotion in the eastern sector, the original transverse wall ordered the spiritual experience for anyone who entered the church, whether pilgrim, clergy, or monk. In this sense its insertion might be interpreted as an improvement and clarification of the essential functions housed in San Paolo. Of course, thanks to the permeability of its arcades, the wall permitted these functions to overlap when necessary. Indeed, in the eastern sector of the transept, both veneration and minor liturgies could take place. In sum, the installation of the transverse wall resulted in a rather careful and sensitive sort of transformation, with important effects not only high up in the rafters but also at ground level, where people interacted with it regularly.

In addition to these functional divisions, the transverse wall capitalized on the scenographic potential of the throne and altar: the first symbolizing the authority of the pope, the second denoting, at one and the same time, the Eucharist celebrated above it and the apostolic tradition embodied by the tomb below. In this way, Christological, apostolic, and papal symbolism converged within the presbytery. Meanwhile, the sculpted architectural details of the transverse wall’s central columns further augmented the decorum of this important space. The northern column (on the right as one looked from the apse) stood on an ornamented and spoliated base that was justifiably appreciated

Fig. 13 (near right). Presbytery and crypts

at San Paolo after the construction of the transverse wall

(author’s digital collage of Kirschbaum 1959,

fig. 3 and Fontana 1879, 5:pl. 2: section through

the transept and open confessio).

Fig. 14 (far right). Fontana 1879, 5:pl.

2: section through the transept and open

confessio.

22 The name “Oratorio di San Giuliano” has been the cause of much confusion for scholars since, from the nineteenth century onward, it has been applied to the frescoed space immediately to the south of the transept. As first proposed by Schuster 1934, 234 and accepted by Dos Santos 2007, this lat-ter space apparently served as the monastery’s chapter house.

23 Panvinio 1570, 96–97; see also Ugonio 1588, 237.

24 Many of the tombs and altars were moved when the transept was rearranged under Sixtus V (1585–1590); thus Panvinio’s description should be considered an estimation of earlier conditions.


and frequently represented by early modern draftsmen (fig. 15).25 The southern column (on the left as one looked from the apse) was less ornate but was fashioned from prized Egyptian gray granite, a type frequently used in Cosmatesque pavements.26 Both columns were topped by Corinthian capitals ornamented with a fleuron in the abacus, while their entablatures featured a lushly ornamented pulvinated frieze.27 Every detail—from base to shaft and from capital to entablature—was endowed with a rich, visual appeal that enhanced the impact of the presbytery enclosure as a whole. The two red granite Corinthian columns, 8.85 m in height, which supported the central arch of the transverse wall, were matched to the preexisting pair of gray Ionic columns beneath the triumphal arch (fig. 16).28 For observers in the nave or transept, the four massive and ornamented columns worked in unison to strengthen the visual impact by framing the entire presbytery while decorously echoing the columns of the ciborium on a monumental scale.

25 Some notable depictions of the celebrated northern base include those by: Fra Giocondo, the author of the Codex Coner, Giovanni Battista da Sangallo, Alberto Alberti, Vignola, and G. B. Piranesi (fig. 15).

26 Ambrogi 2009. Both column bases and a portion of the entablature are currently located along the passeggiata archeo-logica. This is a collection of marbles salvaged following the fire and displayed directly to the south of the nave.

27 As Herbert Kessler has noted, the pulvinated frieze is similar in style and placement to those in the triumphal arch of Santa Maria in Trastevere. See Kessler 2004, 19.

28 Similarly to the way that Bramante’s New St. Peter’s may have provided inspiration for the backdrop of Raphael’s School of Athens, it is apparent that the view from the nave following the construction of the transverse wall strongly resembled the arrangement adopted in his Mass of Bolsena fresco.

Fig. 15. Piranesi 1761, pl. 9: ornamented Attic base of the transverse wall.

Fig. 16. Alexandr Brullov, view after the fire, watercolor, 1823 (© 2012, Russian Museum, St. Petersburg).


The stroke of theatricality that linked these elements was of particular importance—given the historical fact that, just before the transverse wall was constructed, the belief had arisen that the altar at San Paolo contained not only the remains of St. Paul but those of St. Peter as well. To be more specific, it was believed at this time that the relics of the two saints had been combined and then distributed for burial in the basilicas devoted to them (San Paolo, and St. Peter’s in the Vatican). This tradition of “apostolic concomitance” persisted in popular belief until the eighteenth century, and versions of it may be found in most of the early modern guidebooks to Rome.29 The persistence of this belief is signaled, for example, by Panvinio, who describes the main altar as dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul.30 It is something of a mistake, then, for modern historians to limit the veneration of the “Princes of the Apostles” to their eponymous basilicas, since the main altars of both of them were believed, for many centuries, to preserve the relics of both apostles.

For reasons that remain unclear, the concept of apostolic concomitance emerged during the third decade of the twelfth century. Pope Callixtus II (1119–1124), for example, dedicated the main altar at St. Peter’s Basilica to both Peter and Paul on 25 March 1123.31 Five years later, the first hard evidence for this new belief was inscribed on the sarcophagus of Pietro di Leone, the leader of one of Rome’s most powerful clans, the Pierleoni. The burial took place in 1128, under the auspices of Petrus Pierleoni, the titular cardinal of Santa Maria in Trastevere, who had become the heir to the family’s vast fortunes. The pater familias was buried in a reused ancient sarcophagus (fig. 17), which was placed at San Paolo (likely in the atrium) with this invocation, still legible, on its lid: “May Peter and Paul protect you, Peter son of Leo. / May they whom you have reverently loved pres-ent your soul to Heaven. / And may you share their glory, as you share their grave.”32 This prayer, which was directed to both apostles, expressed the belief that the deceased buried at the basilica

29 See Kirschbaum 1959, 207–212, esp. n. 65, where the au-thor provides an extensive survey of twenty-seven pilgrimage guidebooks that confirmed the belief in the concomitance of the apostolic relics.

30 Panvinio 1560, 47.

31 To dedicate the altar, Pope Callixtus employed relics of both apostles. These were found in a casket that should not be confused with the bones of St. Peter allegedly uncovered lower in the stratigraphy. Kirschbaum argues that, unbe-

Fig. 17. Rome, San Paolo, Sarcophagus of Pietro di Leone (photo Robert Glass).

knownst to Callixtus, these were merely “contact relics” (i.e., fabric that had been in contact with bodily relics, thereby acquiring their spiritual power) of the apostles that had been placed within the altar at St. Peter’s, probably by Gregory the Great (590–604). For this casket and its relics, see Apollonj Ghetti 1951, 192 and Kirschbaum 1959, 207–212.

32 The original inscription reads: Te Petrus et Paulus [con]servent, Petre Leonis. / Dent animam caelo, quos tam devote amasti / Et, quibus est idem tumulus, sit gloria tecum.

Fig. 18. Reconstruction of the presbytery at St. Peter’s following the transformation by Pope Gregory, ca. a.d. 600 (from Toynbee and Ward-Perkins 1956, fig. 22).


had been laid to rest in the watchful company of Christian Rome’s founding figures. A few years later, between 1155 and 1159, the abbot Nicholas of Munkathvera in northern Iceland described, in his travel diary, the concomitance of the apostles: “under [the high altar of St. Peter’s] are half the bones of SS. Peter and Paul, apostles of God, and half (the bones) of each of the two are in the church of S. Paolo.”33 This fusion of the two apostolic patrons of Rome makes a good deal of sense when we consider the fact that, since the time of Pope Leo the Great (440–461), Peter and Paul had been considered the Romulus and Remus of Christian Rome.34 For centuries, papal claims to spiritual authority depended on the presence of their relics in the city’s most important basilicas.35 The persistent belief in apostolic concomitance was challenged publicly and convincingly only in 1776, by the noted theologian and historian Cardinal Stephano Borgia.36 Therefore, from the early twelfth century until the late eighteenth century, the juxtaposition of altar/saintly tomb and throne at both St. Peter’s and San Paolo provided an architectural reminder, and a physical testament, of the apostolic tradition that granted authority to the popes in Rome.

The notion of apostolic concomitance deepened the already strong kinship between the basilicas of Saints Peter and Paul in both conceptual and architectural terms. Their interconnectedness had been manifest since their initial construction—a circumstance that inspired Richard Krautheimer to describe the design of the earlier St. Peter’s as “experimental” in comparison to the more refined iteration built a few generations after at San Paolo.37 Two critical points of comparison between the buildings were the sizes of the transepts and the location of the apostolic tomb within them.38 The vastness of San Paolo’s transept and apse—each of them more than 60 percent larger than at St. Peter’s—betrays the builders’ preference for an expansive transept around an apostolic tomb. Likewise, the decision to build the Pauline basilica with the fixed tomb of Paul as the hinge between transept and nave, rather than place it at the center of the apse as at St. Peter’s, suggests a desire not to relegate the tomb to an apsidal recess. At San Paolo, the increased surface area and the centrally placed tomb/altar enhanced the overall accessibility to and, presumably, the visibility of the basilica’s focus.39 Krautheimer was right to interpret San Paolo as a response to the problems that had arisen at St. Peter’s. However, as we have already seen with the vast imperial spaces of antiquity, a design that suited one generation may have been problematic to another.

As increasingly elaborate liturgical practices developed, both basilicas required changes. Fol-lowing the transformations instituted by Pope Gregory (590–604), the layout at St. Peter’s acquired significant liturgical and symbolic advantages, advantages that it had previously lacked (fig. 18). Gregory’s renovations elevated the presbytery above a crypt, thereby permitting the tomb of St.

33 Magoun 1940, 280, 284.

34 The most exquisite example of this idea appears in Leo’s Sermon 82, where the pontiff compares Peter and Paul with Rome’s mythical founders. See Pope Leo I, “Sermon 82,” in Feltoe 1895.

35 In time, this came to include the Lateran Palace, which had housed a reliquary of the heads of Saints Paul and Peter since the late eleventh century. Under Pope Urban V (1362–1370), this reliquary was moved into the basilica.

36 Though the conclusions of Borgia’s 1776 publication Vaticana confessio Beati Petri principis apostolorum […] were echoed in pilgrimage guidebooks and disseminated to the faithful at large, in reality it was Pietro Paolo Ginanni, Abbot of San Paolo, who first dealt a blow to the long-held belief in apostolic concomitance. On 7 December 1744, he

held a conference at the Accademia di Storia Ecclesiastica in the presence of Pope Benedict XIV and argued that the body of each apostle was preserved uniquely in its respective basilica. See Chracas, Diario Ordinario, no. 4272, 12 Decem-ber 1744. Previously, Baronio (via Grimaldi), Bosio (in Roma sotterranea of 1650), and Severano (in Memorie sacre delle sette chiese of 1630) had been skeptical of concomitance.

37 Krautheimer 1937–1977, 5:281.

38 At St. Peter’s, the transept measured 17 m by 64 m and the apse was 17 m in diameter. At San Paolo, the transept was 24 m by 71 m, and the apse measured 23 m in diameter.

39 Important sarcophagi have been discovered in the immedi-ate vicinity of both apostolic tombs. A recent treatment of those at San Paolo is found in Utro 2009.


Peter to function as the liturgical and devotional hinge of the basilica. In the crypt, pilgrims could venerate Peter’s relics. In the presbytery above, the liturgy could be performed against the backdrop of the apse. From the papal throne—strategically placed at the apex—the apse at St. Peter’s spread forth like an embrace to include the altar and its corresponding tomb below.40 In sum, the Grego-rian transformation offered a new cohesion to the liturgical, devotional, and symbolic components, centered at the tomb of Peter. The Liber Pontificalis reports that at San Paolo, Pope Gregory raised the presbytery and probably established a crypt below. These transformations were intended to enhance the liturgical and devotional functions at the tomb of St. Paul.41 Thanks to the non-apsidal locations of tomb, altar, and papal throne, however, a cohesive arrangement like the one at St. Peter’s was not possible to achieve. In comparison to the situation at St. Peter’s, the Pauline presbytery and its corresponding crypt stood unmoored within the cavernous transept.

In this light, the decision to split the core of the basilica at San Paolo not only facilitated reroofing the transept but also grounded the presbytery and heightened its visibility in a fashion akin to the apsidal arrangement at St. Peter’s. Indeed, by framing the presbytery with four monolithic columns, and by crowning the papal throne with its arch, the transverse wall highlighted the liturgical and de-votional functions of the basilica’s core and gave visual form to the papacy’s claim to authority (see fig. 13). To put it another way, the timely construction of the transverse wall, less than two decades after the acknowledgment of apostolic concomitance, strengthened the essential apostolic (and thus papal) meanings ascribed to the basilica. In this way, the new wall heightened rather than compromised the identity of San Paolo and further secured the basilica’s position in Rome’s sacred topography.

3

The Liber Pontificalis identifies Pope Innocent II (1130–1143) as the patron of the transverse wall. The key passage states: “Also in the church of Saint Paul [Innocent II] firmly strengthened the roof, which threatened collapse, with a wall built atop marble columns and restored a portion of that same church’s roof with long beams.”42 But the question of the wall’s patronage is complicated by the fact that the pontificate of Innocent II began with a troubled eight-year period of schism, during which time Innocent hardly set foot in Rome. Furthermore, Innocent’s challenger to the papal throne was none other than the aforementioned Cardinal Petrus Pierleoni, who, two years before ascending to the papacy as Anacletus II (1130–1138), had buried his father at San Paolo.

40 Krautheimer 1937–1977, 5:284.

41 The archaeological excavations undertaken by Giorgio Filippi of the Vatican Museums seem to confirm that Gregory’s restorations were not as revolutionary as previously thought. Indeed, it is possible that as early as the time of Leo the Great (440–461), the apostolic tomb functioned as a site of both veneration and liturgy. In this light, Gregory’s intervention served merely to segregate the two practices. Gregory’s intervention is known through the Liber Pontificalis and also from a letter written to the empress Constantina. For both, see Docci 2006, 67ff. For a summation of the excava-tions, see Filippi 2009a. It should be noted that Brandenburg has questioned the use of the tomb as an altar before the time of Pope Gregory. See Brandenburg 2009, 23.

42 Liber Pontificalis 2:384: In ecclesia quoque beati Pauli tectum qui ruinam minabatur, constructo super columnis marmoreis muro, firmisssime roboravit, et partem tecti eiusdem ecclesiae longissimis trabibus resarcivit. The Liber also describes a fire caused by lightning around 1115 as the probable cause for the extensive repairs. See Liber Pontificalis 2:301: “The church of San Paolo was struck by lightning near the apse, with the result that the lead of the roof melted and the beams were visibly burning. And, indeed, the entire church would have burned immediately except that the people of Rome prevented it, rushing together with water and the help of the apostles. The beams still bear the marks [of this event] (Edem sancti Pauli ex tribunali igne de caelo tactam, ut et tecti plumbum conflaretur et trabes visibiliter arderent; profecto arderet tota, nisi aqua et auxilio apostolorum confluentes populi Urbis obstarent; monstrant indicia trabes.)”


As it turns out, that burial represented a culmination of decades of mutual support between Anacletus’s family and the monastic community at San Paolo. The Pierleoni family owned land close to the church and interacted with the monks who lived adjacent to the basilica.43 More significantly, the influential monks repeatedly positioned themselves against the Frangipane family, who were the Pierleonis’ sworn rivals.44 This situation came to a head when Anastasius, abbot at San Paolo, was among those who signed to elect Anacletus—instead of the Frangipane candidate Gregorio Papareschi (who took the name Innocent II)—thus initiating the eight-year papal schism on 14 February 1130. Just a month after his election, Anacletus confirmed San Paolo’s territorial possessions and supplemented them with a few more territories.45 Anacletus also elevated abbot Anastasius to the cardinalate. That these are among Anacletus’s first known decrees serves at the very least to underscore the antipope’s close bond with San Paolo.46 Shortly after Anacletus’s death (early in 1138), the monastery was forced to align with Pope Innocent, who had, in the meantime, returned to Rome from northern Europe, where he had been garnering political support. Abbott Azzo—a successor of Anastasius—was present at the Lateran Council organized by Innocent the following year. For the monks at San Paolo, this was not a felicitous moment, since Innocent quickly rescinded Anacletus’s donation of new territorial possessions.47 The factions come across as similarly polarized in the surviving correspondence from Innocent’s court, which includes not a single mention of San Paolo. This evidence has been collected in the Patrologia Latina, which contains 598 letters of Innocent II and 52 letters of Anacletus II.48 For the period of the schism, the Patrologia contains only a few items that mention San Paolo, but significantly all of this material was written by Anacletus or makes reference to him. Indeed, the only written evidence of Innocent’s interest in San Paolo is the description of the transverse wall contained in the Liber Pontificalis.

When it comes to the matter of who actually commissioned or built the transverse wall at San Paolo, it appears that there are two competing possibilities. On the one hand, it is possible to ac-cept the account in the Liber Pontificaliºs as accurate. Upon returning to Rome, Innocent might have moved to assert his control over sites associated with his defeated opponent. Dale Kinney has proposed just this kind of motive in connection to Innocent’s reconstruction of Santa Maria

43 In 1051, three plots of land for cultivation outside San Paolo were sold by the abbot to Leone, Anacletus’s grand-father. See Schuster 1934, 93.

44 In 1105, an ardent Frangipane ally named Stefano Corsi raided the monastic compound. From here he organized incursions into the city and the adjacent countryside to chal-lenge the Pierleoni and papal possessions. For more on how the situation was resolved and how Stefano’s life was spared on account of his escape from San Paolo disguised as a monk, see Palumbo 1995, 126. Closer to the period of the schism, the Pauline monks’ pro-Pierleoni stance was demonstrated by the refuge they offered to Pope Gelasius (1118–1119), who had been forced into exile by the Frangipane clan.

45 Sutri, Albano, Ardea, and the remainder of the nearby complex of the Aquae Salviae were added to San Paolo’s possessions. See Schuster 1934, 94–97.

46 Regesta 1885–1888, 913; Patrologia Latina, 179:692; and Masotti 1978, 69ff. Masotti has suggested that it was the norm for a diploma or a privilege directed to the monastery to be

directed to St. Paul himself, in the second person. In contrast, Anacletus’s donations named Abbot Anastasius specifically. The quid pro quo between Anacletus and Anastasius is also discussed by Schuster 1934, 95 and Palumbo 1995, 412. Filipe Dos Santos has proposed that Abbot Anastasius was the patron of the frescoed chapter house immediately to the south of the transept. See Dos Santos 2007.

47 Pope Innocent’s subtraction of territorial privileges from San Paolo was carried out in favor of a newcomer: the Cister-cians of St. Bernard of Clairvaux. In gratitude for Bernard’s role in shifting the opinions of northern European prelates and royalty, Pope Innocent offered St. Bernard the site of the Aquae Salviae for his Cistercian community. It was endowed and rebuilt as Sant’Anastasio alle Tre Fontane. Another Bernard (of Pisa) became its first abbot, and as a sign of the ascendency of the Cistercian Order, he was ultimately elevated to the papacy as Eugenius III (1145–1151). See Barclay Lloyd 2006.

48 Regesta 1895–1888, 840–919; Watterich 1966, 174–275; Palumbo 1995, 89–90 and appendix.


in Trastevere, his rival’s titular church—which also happened to be located in a neighborhood af-filiated with Anacletus’s family.49 Krautheimer has suggested that, in the case of Santa Maria, Pope Innocent might merely have completed work begun by Anacletus.50 It is conceivable, then, that at the Basilica of San Paolo, Innocent also sought to appropriate a space that had been visibly as-sociated with his rival. The restored transept roof and the enhanced visibility and framing of the presbytery would have garnered attention and surely earned respect from the adjacent monastic community, to whom Innocent had recently denied territorial rights. That said, it is curious that the pope’s interest in the basilica appears not to have spread to the monastery and that not a single inscription among the hundreds recorded within the basilica commemorates such a massive un-dertaking as the transverse wall.51

On the other hand, there is more than sufficient evidence to question the factuality of Innocent’s biography and ascribe the transverse wall to Anacletus. Innocent’s Liber Pontificalis biography was written around the mid-1160s by the English cardinal Boso (Breakspear, d. 1178), who made a prac-tice of downplaying, if not demonizing, the later antipapacies of Victor IV (1159–1164) and Paschal III (1164–1168), who had challenged the legitimacy of Alexander III (1159–1181).52 During this conflicted, schismatic period, Boso might have been averse to mentioning, much less celebrating, the achievements of an antipope like Anacletus. In her study of the Anacletan schism, Mary Stroll has ar-gued that: “The victors of the schism”—and I would add their later biographers, too—“used all their wiles to conceal the antipope’s authorship of anything he inspired or with which he was associated.”53 The concerted effort to eradicate any evidence of Anacletus’s patronage in Rome is documented at San Lorenzo in Lucina, where the inscription of the altar dedication was conspicuously falsified and reassigned to Innocent.54 Likewise, the frescoes in the Lateran Chapel of St. Nicholas show signs of Innocent’s (or a later pope’s) attempt to eradicate traces of Anacletan patronage.55 In a similar form of damnatio, Innocent may just as readily have removed any Anacletan inscription at San Paolo.56

Stroll has rightly described the schism of 1130–1138 as a clan-based power struggle rather than one based on ideological or theological divergences.57 It makes sense, then, to presume that Anacletus’s opponents would have viewed San Paolo as a sort of dynastic stronghold. Its apostolic concomitance could have simultaneously strengthened the claims of the Anacletan clan (through Pietro di Leone’s tomb) and affirmed the antipope’s authority (through the transverse wall’s framing of the presbytery). To summarize, Innocent’s penchant for appropriation, Cardinal Boso’s concern for a revised and sani-tized history, the legacy of decades of mutual support between the Pierleoni and San Paolo (not an inconsiderable period considering medieval Rome’s fickle alliances), and, finally, Anacletus’s personal incentive to restore the basilica that housed his father’s tomb all point to Anacletan patronage and

49 Kinney 1975, 206.

50 Krautheimer 1980, 163. The similarity of certain spoli-ated elements, such as the pulvinated friezes, may point to a shared patronage, or at least a common source of construc-tion material.

51 An exhaustive compendium of inscriptions from the basilica was assembled by Cornelio Margarini, the chief archivist of the Congregation of Monte Cassino, to which the monastery of San Paolo belonged. See Margarini 1654.

52 Kinney 1975, 194. For a commentary on Cardinal Boso’s biographies, see Louis Duchesne’s introduction in Liber Pontificalis 2:xlii.

53 Stroll 1987, 109.

54 For some compelling discussions of the Innocentine cover-up, see Grossi Gondi 1913 and Gandolfo 1974–1975, 211ff. The papers from the conference, “Framing Anacletus II,” held in April 2013 in Rome, should shed further light on this fascinating moment in Roman history.

55 Duchesne 1889; Herklotz 2000, 152–153.

56 For that matter, the churches of Santo Stefano and Santi Cosma e Damiano also lack any epigraphic evidence for the significant transformations undertaken there.

57 Stroll 1987.


Innocentine appropriation.58 In the end, however, it should be evident that the transverse wall would have benefitted either or both popes. The split core of the basilica could unleash multiple meanings.

Whoever began its construction—or, indeed, finished it—there can be no doubt that, over the centuries, the transverse wall at San Paolo gradually became integrated into the fabric of the building as a whole. This long-term development reminds us that in tracing the history of monuments such as this one, their meanings should not be defined or limited to their moment of inception alone. To lose sight of the long, rich lives of these structures is to forgo the opportunity to examine how transformations of the sort recounted here operated over time, as physical manifestations of the roles that a building played across time, not to mention the need to maintain its relevance through a process of perpetual updating. It takes a lot of work and adaptation for a building and its component parts to endure.

4

In the final section of this article, we shall consider the overarching legacy of the transverse wall over time. The splitting of the liturgical and devotional core of San Paolo unleashed a concatena-tion of transformations that affected the basilica long after the wall was raised. Like the frames inserted into beehives, the transverse wall was a structure upon which a variety of forms accrued. Some additions were probably not intended at the wall’s inception, others hardly could have been imagined, but all made use of it in various ways and, in the process, helped to integrate it further into the larger fabric of the basilica.

Over the centuries, the transverse wall provided a backdrop for many of the basilica’s secondary altars. At a church the caliber of San Paolo, the existence of multiple altars reflected the number, variety, and importance of relics enshrined within. The first mention of multiple altars at San Paolo dates to the papacy of Gregory III (731–741), who ordered that five Masses be celebrated at five dif-ferent altars on a daily basis.59 While the regularity of these Masses was not perpetually maintained, the number of altars in the basilica continued to grow.60 Since we lack any late medieval sources for the liturgical arrangement at San Paolo (aside from the presbytery examined above), our first physical evidence of a secondary altar in the transept dates to 1494, when Cardinal Guillaume de Périer (1420–1500) dedicated one to St. Bartholomew (fig. 19).61 Panvinio’s sketch of the transept

58 For the suggestion that the Pierleoni family dabbled in antiquities and exported marbles to be used as spolia, see Deér 1959, 120–123. The family business may have been a convenient source of materials for Anacletus. I am grateful to Dale Kinney for this reference.

59 For a discussion of Gregory III’s mandate, see Schuster 1934, 20. A monastic community had been associated with the basilica as early as 604, when it was mentioned in an inscription by Pope Gregory I. Around 715, Pope Gregory II requested that monastic offices be performed over the tomb of the apostle three times a day in addition to the usual matins. See Liber Pontificalis 1:397. These offices did not involve the celebration of Mass, since most monks were not ordained. As early as the pontificate of Simplicius (468–483), a rotating entourage of clergy was assigned from the city’s parish churches to say Mass and administer the sacraments at San Paolo, for which see Liber Pontificalis 1:249; Schuster 1934, 16.

60 The increase in altars was probably related to the increas-ing ordination of monks. How the number and dedication of altars changed over time is a subject worthy of its own study. In 1514, San Paolo had fourteen altars, according to an anonymous manuscript in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (Cod. Vat. Lat. 6041, fol. 105). Seven major altars were reported by Ugonio 1588, 237–238 and by del Sodo 1587, 283. In 1665, there were eleven altars according to sources examined by Nardoni, 235.

61 Cardinal de Périer commissioned several altars in churches in Rome and vicinity. See Müntz 1898, 34. Sometime between 1588 and 1639, this particular altar was moved from the transverse wall and placed to the right (as one entered) of the basilica’s central door and rededicated to St. Paul. The chronological range for the transfer is derived from Ugonio, who mentions a different altar at the counter-façade in 1588, and from Baglione, who noted its presence at the counter-façade. See Ugonio 1588, 238; and Baglione 1639, 48.


(see fig. 12) indicates that the altar was positioned against the southern arm of the transverse wall, not far from the Cosmatesque “carpet.” The sketch (and Panvinio’s accompanying text) also report that the northern arm of the transverse wall hosted a pendant altar dedicated to St. Stephen and endowed by the Capranica family.62 Precisely when subsidiary altars—these or earlier ones—were first located in the transept remains unknown. Likewise, not much can be said regarding the origins of an additional four altars that were placed in the northern and southern ends of the transept. These spaces resulted from the conjunction of the transept with the transverse wall (figs. 3, 19, and 20). These altars are depicted and identified in Panvinio’s drawing, although their dedications varied

Fig. 19. Plan of liturgical and devotional

arrangement of the transept as

recounted by Panvinio (based on Docci 2006, pl.

3, p. 176).

Fig. 20. Plan of liturgical and devotional

arrangement of the transept following the

Sistine and Clementine transformations

(based on Docci 2006, pl. 3, p. 176 and pl. 1, p.

174).

62 Panvinio 1560, 47. At this time, the altar of St. Stephen stood beneath a marble ciborium supported by both the transverse wall and a pair of freestanding and fluted columns.


slightly over the centuries.63 In all of the extant views, except for Panvinio’s early plans, these altars appear in the guise they acquired around 1600.64 There can be little doubt that its central location, abundant surface area, and prime visibility made the transverse wall a desirable home for such secondary places of liturgy and veneration.

As a whole, this ensemble of altars represents the most important saints venerated by the neigh-boring community of monks and by pilgrims. They are also as close as San Paolo came to acquiring side chapels, a feature that became common in late-medieval and post-medieval basilicas in Rome.65 Indeed, the transverse wall’s partitioning of the transept may well account for the peculiar absence of the more traditional type of side chapels at San Paolo. We may presume that these secondary altars were not dedicated at a single moment. In Rome’s oldest churches, features like these typically accrued over time, rather than as part of large-scale liturgical or decorative programs.66

However, a truly systemic reorganization took place at San Paolo during the papacy of Sixtus V (1585–1590). Around 1587, the transverse wall was used to support a suspended coffered ceiling above both sectors of the transept (see fig. 5). As it turned out, the presence of the wall necessitated the installation of two independent ceilings. The inlaid wooden ceiling hid the previously open timber roof.67 Catervo Foglietta, an important observer of Sistine Rome, described its construction admiringly: “In the church of St. Paul rich and beautiful ceilings were begun.”68 A dedicatory inscription in the ceiling names Cardinal Alessandro Farnese (1520–1589), whose patronage was conducted on behalf of the monks for whom he had served as abbate commendatario since 1548.69 The heraldry depicted in a nineteenth-century view (see fig. 5) confirms that the ceiling was sponsored under papal auspices by the Benedictine establishment. Indeed, the new ceiling was the monastery’s specific contribution to the expansive transformations that Pope Sixtus V undertook in the transept below. At ground level, work commenced in the wake of the Sistine bull Egregia populi of 13 February 1586. This bull aimed

63 During Panvinio’s time, the altar in the east side of the southern transept was dedicated to the Annunciation and endowed by the Orsini family. After the transformations carried out during the papacy of Clement VIII, just before 1600, it was rededicated to the Assumption and provided with a painting by Girolamo Muziano da Brescia (which was destroyed during the fire). Also during Panvinio’s time an altar to St. Anthony stood at the southwest side of the transept. In all likelihood, the marble bas-relief altarpiece with Saints Anthony, Dionysus, and Justine also stood here. The Anthony altar was subsequently moved to the nave, as a counterpart to de Périer’s altar, and both remained here until the fire. It is currently preserved in the Chapel of San Lorenzo, off of the southern transept arm. During the Clem-entine innovations the southwest side of the transept became an altar to St. Stephen, which included a work by Lavinia Fontana. In the northwest corner of the transept stood the altar of the Conversion of St. Paul, also dedicated to Paul in Panvinio’s time. Finally, during Panvinio’s survey of ca. 1560, the northeast corner of the transept hosted an altar dedicated to the Virgin and endowed by the Massimo family. By 1570, its dedication had been changed to St. Benedict. The painting of St. Benedict for this altar by Giovanni De’ Vecchi dal Borgo survives only as a copy by Antonio Viviani, in the Church of San Magno at Amelia.

64 Felini 1610; Totti 1638, 117. Pope Clement undertook a restoration at the Lateran transept as well. See Freiberg 1995.

65 Late medieval Roman churches with extensive side chapels include the mendicant churches of Santa Maria in Aracoeli and Santa Maria sopra Minerva. Major Counter-Reformation examples include San Filippo Neri and the Gesù.

66 Panvinio 1560, 47.

67 Other Roman churches with early modern suspended ceil-ings include San Marco, installed between 1465 and 1468; Santa Maria Maggiore, ca. 1495; Santa Maria in Domnica, 1566; Santa Maria in Aracoeli, 1572–1575, along with many others. See Antinori 1992.

68 Foglietta 1987.

69 According to Nicolai, the inscription read: al. far. pr. / sisti p.v. / anno iii / c.s.ae wst / a.d. md / lxxvii. Nicolai 1815, 21, 261, 308. But the date reported by Nicolai is a typo and should read MDLXXXVIII. Francesco Cancellieri, who compiled—but never published—a valuable study on San Paolo, reported: “The entirety of the transept was covered by an inlaid cypress ceiling, which in lumber alone cost 40,000 scudi. It was completed under Sixtus V in 1588.” It was pretty common for suspended ceilings of that period to be made of cypress, but the cost was remarkable. Cancellieri (p. 115) is the only source to mention the cost.


to renew and expand the tradition of stational liturgies practiced by the early church.70 Accordingly, the papal court would journey to San Paolo to perform Pontifical Masses (cappelle pontificie) on the second Sunday of Lent and the fourth Sunday of Advent, in addition to an already established visit to celebrate the Conversion of St. Paul every 25 January. As Sible de Blaauw has shown, the presbytery around the main altar had proved inadequate and cramped for the officiants present at such events by the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.71 Surely, then, the pomp of the Sistine Pontifical Masses would require altering its layout. At the very least, the papal throne and the columns from the pres-bytery’s apsidiole were removed and a (presumably new) throne was placed at the apex of the apse, flanked by seating for the College of Cardinals and the rest of the pontifical entourage.72 The crypt of Saints Julian, Celsus, Basilissa, and Marcionilla, whose entrance was at the chord of the apse, was covered over during the Sistine transformations, for it was an obvious impediment to the circulation of clergy. Likewise, the altars of St. Timothy, of the Holy Innocents, and a large sculpted sarcophagus were cleared from the apse.73 Under Sixtus, the direct veneration of relics seems to have taken a back seat to liturgy. A shift in the use and meaning of the transept had taken place.

These transformations had repercussions for the transverse wall as well. Its framing of the presbytery was undone once Sixtus dismantled that space.74 In terms of program, circulation, and visibility, the apse and the main altar became connected, as at St. Peter’s albeit over a far greater distance. In such a revolutionary scheme, the transverse wall could play only a small role: the cen-tral red columns marked a midpoint of sorts along the new space that devoted the entire width of the transept to the Pontifical Masses. As a result, any distinction between spaces of veneration and liturgy that had been fostered in the past by the transverse wall was blurred. There is no reason to doubt that immediately following the Sistine renovations, the entrance to the apostolic crypt remained, awkwardly set beneath the apex of the transverse wall’s central arch at the heart of the transept. Indeed, the remains of St. Julian and his companions had been transferred there. Whatever its appearance might have been in the immediate aftermath of the Sistine reorganization, the crypt, having lost its anchoring to the presbytery and throne, probably resembled a sinkhole more than anything else. But this situation did not last long, and the transverse wall again proved instrumental in shifting the use, appearance, and meaning of the basilica’s core.

The transept that resulted from Sixtus V’s prioritization of liturgy was transformed once again during the papacy of Clement VIII (1592–1605). On the eve of the 1600 Jubilee, the apos-tolic crypt was entirely remodeled into an open and sunken confessio (see figs. 14 and 20), and equipped with a double ramp of curved steps to permit access and egress for the three million pilgrims estimated to have visited the city that year.75 In a clear reversal of Sistine ideas, the

70 De Blaauw 2003, 279–283.

71 De Blaauw 2003, 281 nn. 74 and 75.

72 The gradual dismantling of the presbytery is recounted by Ugonio 1588, 237. Severano—more than a century after the transformation—declared that the demolition of the pres-bytery was carried out under Sixtus V. See Severano 1630, 388. For interpretations of this transformation, see Pesarini 1913, 414–415; Docci 2006, 113–117. My presumption that a new throne was placed in the apse is fueled by the 1506 description of the decrepit medieval throne noted by de Blaauw 2003, 280 n. 71.

73 During the pontificate of Sixtus V, the relics of the saints

formerly in the apsidal crypt were transferred to the apos-tolic crypt, as recounted by Ugonio 1588, 237. For a careful analysis of the sarcophagus of St. Timothy, see Filippi 2009a, 41–43; Filippi 2009b, 134–139.

74 It is unlikely that a new presbytery with permanent barriers stretched from altar to apse, and it is unclear what happened to the remainder of the presbytery enclosure. Since we must assume that the level of the main altar remained elevated with respect to the transept, presumably an access to it via steps was constructed in the direction of the apse.

75 This alteration occurred no later than February 1597, as we know thanks to a letter by Cesare Baronio, who reports that he had acquired the liturgical furniture of the crypt from


direct veneration of relics was prioritized, and the coveted connection between apse and altar was abolished.76 Additionally, Sixtus’s Pontifical Masses were officially abandoned under Clement VIII. Had this not occurred, such an open confessio would not have been built, for it effectively obstructed the circulation between apse and altar. But what the confessio compromised liturgi-cally, it made up for by providing an open and manageable space for the veneration of relics by pilgrims. Both the elevated main altar and the sunken open confessio were enclosed by a low balustrade that remained in place until the 1823 fire. As during the Middle Ages, both foci were contained within the western sector of the transept and framed by the monumental columns of the triumphal and transverse arches.

During the Clementine papacy, but probably initiated under the auspices of the monastic com-munity, the transept acquired the layout that survived until the fire. In the apse, which no longer played host to the papal court, a grandiose altar (see fig. 1) was built for and by the monks.77 Ad-ditionally, four altars at the northern and southern ends of the transept were rebuilt and rededicated (see fig. 20). The resulting scheme created four distinct but unified “side chapels,” defined by the transverse wall.78 The effect of this concentration of altars in the transept was clear: here was the undisputed liturgical and devotional core of the building. The transverse wall partitioned the tran-sept into numerous altars, which cumulatively charged the space with a spiritual significance that supplemented the basilica’s principal apostolic legacy.

The transverse wall itself returned to prominence in the middle of the eighteenth century when Pope Benedict XIV (1740–1758) employed it to extend the series of papal portraits that had lined the walls of the nave, some since the middle of the fifth century.79 The new portraits, which extended the series to include contemporary popes, were painted in paired oval frames along a thick colorful frieze that stretched around the walls of the transept and on both sides of the transverse wall (see figs. 3, 4, and 14). The new series began with Stephen III (752–757) immediately to the north of the triumphal arch. Around 1750, the basilica’s chief archaeologist, Giovanni Marangoni, and Sal-vadore Manosili, a painter, worked under the supervision of Abbot Capece to carry out the task.80 Of course, the depictions of earlier pontiffs were not accurate portraits, but this did not matter, for the images were to be taken as a whole to give visual form to the papacy’s claim of an uninterrupted line from St. Peter to modern times.

the abbot of San Paolo and intended to use it in his own construction projects. For Cesare Baronio’s spoliation of the liturgical furniture from San Paolo, see Herz 1988 and Turco 1997. For a discussion of the importance of the confessio in a broader Roman context, see Ostrow 2009, esp. 23–24.

76 The insertion of the open confessio so close to the main altar also prevented the saying of Mass versus populum, that is, with a priest on the apse side of the main altar facing the faithful in the nave, which had been Sixtus’s idea from the start. De Blaauw 2003, 282.

77 The apsidal altar was designed by Onorio Longhi and includ-ed four Corinthian columns with porphyry shafts. For a more detailed description, see Baglione 1639, 79. It was deemed decadent and demolished in 1834: see Docci 2006, 122.

78 The porphyry columns framing the flanking altars were taken and reused from the former presbytery enclosure. See Moreschi 1840, 9.

79 Pope Benedict XIV’s patronage was marked by an inscrip-tion located beneath his own portrait: see Nicolai 1815, 260 n. 14; Ginanni, 152v–153r.

80 Abbot Giovanni Antonio Maria Capece Orsati di Sor-rento di Napoli was installed on 9 October 1740 and served only until April 1741. He returned to the post in 1748 and remained in office until ca. 1751. Marangoni reports that the new portraits were based on material collected and published by Ciampini (including papal portraits found in donation scenes in Roman apses), on other portraits col-lected by Monsignor Perris in a Vatican codex, and some others engraved under Panvinio: see Marangoni 1751, vii. A text by Cavalieri from 1580, which was based, in turn, on Panvinio’s manuscripts, may also have provided a model: see Teza 1996, 261. Cancellieri noted that Marangoni did not follow the papal series published by Platina, Ciacconio, and Papebrochio. Cancellieri, 48.


By the time the basilica was destroyed in the 1823 fire, the series had been extended, wrapping around all sides of the transverse wall, onto the southern transept, and concluding by the triumphal arch with Pius VI (1775–1799), who went to great effort to extend Benedict’s series to include his own portrait along with the intervening pontiffs. A late edition of Vasi’s Itinerario guidebook re-counted that Pius VII (1800–1823), upon realizing there was no more space in the transept for his portrait, began a new series in the nave.81 Only fate prevented other popes from following his lead.

This constant updating indicates that the papal portraits in the transept were of particular inter-est during the latter half of the eighteenth century. Depending on the papal list that was consulted for the project, the transept should have contained about 158 portraits.82 As the setting for a substantial part of the only complete series of papal portraits in Rome, the transverse wall again drove home the papacy’s apostolic succession as it had at its inception. During the late eighteenth century, at the very moment when the belief in apostolic concomitance was being challenged, the transverse wall was again called on to glorify the papacy—not by highlighting the presbytery but by providing a backdrop for a pictorial expression of papal power. Although the majority of new portraits were in place for less than a century before the 1823 fire, they affirmed—albeit for the last time—that the transverse wall had become an inseparable part of the transept and of the basilica as a whole.

In the wake of the fire, Pope Leo XII (1823–1829) issued a chirograph that established the ground rules for reconstruction: the basilica was to be restored to its pristine early Christian state.83 The meaning of this order was left open to interpretation, and opinions would vary greatly. The death knell of the transverse wall arrived with the pope’s decision to demolish it, after members of the Ac-cademia di San Luca correctly determined it to be a later addition.84 By isolating the transverse wall from the rest of the basilica, the academicians undid the link forged by the builder and subsequent transformers of the transverse wall. Ultimately, their mandate to see the trees instead of the forest brought about the destruction of this venerable structure. But did its medieval origin really make it any less a part of that building’s fabric than the other surviving elements? We might think not. But the desire, almost two centuries ago, to cleanse the new Basilica of San Paolo of any impurities, particularly those from supposedly “barbarian times,” was carried out with ruthless determination.

The transverse wall was demolished beginning 22 September 1826.85 If prior to this moment its continued presence gave mute testimony to its ongoing relevance, durability, and adaptability to

81 Vasi 1820, 380ff.

82 This number of papal portraits finds precise corre-spondence in the visual evidence if one sums the portraits accounted for in views by Antonio Acquaroni (fig. 3) and Andrea Alippi (figs. 2 and 4), and hypothesizes the likely number of portraits for the parts of the walls that are not explicitly depicted.

83 For Leo’s chirograph of 18 September 1825, consult Docci 2006, 148 and Groblewski 2001.

84 The report from the Accademia di San Luca is contained in Rome’s Archivio di Stato, Camerale, III, B. 1911, fasc. 227: “We have seen and examined that in the middle of the side walls of the transept at San Paolo there was an arched opening. This would be incompatible with the transverse wall because this wall bisects and encloses the arched open-ing. We also noticed that this wall was not toothed into the older wall. Furthermore, there is an absence of a similar

structure in all other basilicas. Perhaps the wall in question was raised to abridge the need for length beams in the vast roof. (Essendosi veduto, ed esaminato che nel mezzo dei lati che chiudono la Nave traversa del Tempio di San Paolo esisteva nella primitiva originaria costruzione un vano ar-cuato, il quale sarebbe incompatibile colla edificazione del Muro a traverso, perchè esso muro và appunto ad intestare in detto vano arcuato, e chiuderlo. Essendosi osservato che non vi sono nemmeno le attaccature precise del muro col vecchio. Di più non essendovi nella costruzione di tutte le altre basiliche esempio di tal muro di divisione. Ed essendo forse il muro in questione stato eretto per dividere la tratta delle armature della grande soffitta.)”

85 Rome, Archivio di Stato, Camerale III, B, 1911, fasc. 230 and also fasc. 245, p. 14: “By means of scaffolding and frameworks they lowered not only the cornices and capitals that topped the eight columns that decorated and supported the above-mentioned dividing wall, but also the shafts of the columns, which are witness to the extent that


changing times, the wall’s destruction suggests that it had outlived its protean ability to adapt to the demands of the age. Perhaps this should come as no surprise. Thanks to the devastating effects of the fire, the wall’s contribution to the liturgical arrangement of the interior had been irretrievably compromised by the destruction of several altars in the transept. Its visual evocation of papal lineage had been erased by the destruction of the portraits in the nave. And finally, the advent of modern building techniques and materials had rendered its original, structural contribution obsolete. These are important considerations, since it seems that the proverbial wrecking ball was not employed solely on the basis of whether a structure was original or not. Indeed, both the eighteenth-century Chapel of the Crucifix (today called the Chapel of the Sacrament) and its near contemporary, the eighteenth-century façade of the basilica itself, were originally intended to be preserved. In the end, only the chapel was spared.

To conclude, we have seen that transformations like the transverse wall (and its subsequent transfor-mations) represented moments of heightened interest in the basilica’s physical appearance, structural condition, the functions it housed, or its perceived identity. Speaking more generally, it could be argued that any transformation or renovation distinguishes between the qualities of a building that are valued and those that are deemed dispensable, and selects those for preservation or extinction. (In this sense, the nineteenth-century reconstruction of the basilica was a transformation on a grand scale.) At San Paolo in the twelfth century, the original spatial unity of the transept was considered dispensable, but the pregnant spatial symbolism of the transept that related the apostles to the Basilica of San Paolo and to the papacy was valued and preserved. In fact, this identity was actually strengthened when the transverse wall split the core of the basilica. In addition to roofing the area over the apostolic tomb and ordering the transept into sectors, the transverse wall enhanced the visibility of the presbytery, augmented its decorum, and thereby underscored the union of apostolic tomb, altar, and throne upon which papal authority was founded.

Even the succession of transformations to the wall over time should be understood as mate-rial manifestations of the enduring and sometimes changing themes that were defined by, and in turn helped to define the identity of, the basilica. Although its original patron remains uncertain, in light of the factionalism concurrent with its construction, the transverse wall and the Basilica of San Paolo as a whole emerge as a site of significant contention during the schism of 1130–1138. Following the late Middle Ages, the transverse wall helped conform San Paolo to contemporary Roman church types equipped with secondary side altars. Likewise, by favoring the placement of these altars around the transept, it enhanced the importance of the liturgical and devotional core of the basilica. Toward the end of its existence, the transverse wall provided the backdrop for a unique series of papal portraits, the sum of which proclaimed in pictorial form that pontifical lineage derived from St. Peter. All told, the transverse wall functioned, over time, as something much more than a structural solution. Conceptually, its transformations reveal a tension between continuity and change. This principle invites architectural historians to study transformations as critical responses to a building, and as something essential to the process of understanding the built world over time.

the fire damaged those hardest of oriental stones [. . .] (Per mezzo di ponti e castelli si calarono non solo i cornicioni, ed i capitelli delle otto colonne che decoravano, e sorreggevano

la divisione suddetta, ma anche i fusti delle dette colonne, le quali dimostrano ora ad evidenza quanta forza abbia avuto il fuoco su quei marmi orientali durissimi [. . .]).”


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Splitting the Core: The Transverse Wall at the Basilica of San Paolo in Rome

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