In 1939, Vatican workers digging beneath St. Peter's Basilica — the biggest church in the world — broke through the marble floor while making room for a new papal tomb. The ground gave way, and they dropped into pitch darkness. When the dust settled, they were standing in something that hadn't seen daylight in sixteen hundred years — and they'd just stumbled onto a secret that could prove or shatter the very reason this church was built.
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Prophets & Pilgrims·4/4·1′
The place
Vatican & St. Peter's Basilica
The Discovery of St. Peter's Tomb
How a routine burial project uncovered a 2,000-year-old secret beneath the world's greatest church
1939-1968Vatican & St. Peter's Basilica
Moral of the Story
“Faith and archaeology can converge on the same truth, even if they arrive there by different paths”
Characters
P
Pope Pius XIIP
Pope Paul VIM
Margherita GuarducciA
Antonio FerruaE
Emperor ConstantineSource
Guarducci, Margherita. The Tomb of St. Peter, 1960; Toynbee and Ward-Perkins, The Shrine of St. Peter, 1956; Walsh, John Evangelist. The Bones of St. Peter, 1982