In 1599, workers cracked open a stone coffin beneath a church in Rome. The body inside had been sealed for almost eight hundred years. What they found should have been impossible: a young woman, lying on her side, looking like she’d just fallen asleep. She wasn’t a skeleton. She wasn’t dust. After thirteen centuries, she looked whole. Her name was Cecilia — and the story of how she got there is one of the wildest in all of Rome.
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Prophets & Pilgrims·1/1·1′
The place
Catacombs of Rome
St. Cecilia's Incorrupt Body
The patron saint of music, found untouched by thirteen centuries of death
Martyrdom c. 230 AD; rediscovery 1599Catacombs of Rome
Moral of the Story
“Some stories refuse to stay buried. The people who tried to silence Cecilia are long forgotten, but she’s still here — in the marble, in the music, in every concert hall that carries her name. Sometimes the quietest voice in the room is the one that lasts the longest.”
Characters
S
Saint CeciliaC
Cardinal Paolo Emilio SfondratoS
Stefano Maderno (sculptor)P
Pope Urban IP
Pope Paschal ISource
Acta Sanctorum; Maderno's sculpture documentation; De Rossi, Giovanni Battista. Roma Sotterranea, 1864-77