Out of the Depths...

The Christian Catacombs of Ancient Rome:

                                                 
The Roman catacombs are comprised of 36 separate Christian sites and several pagan and Jewish sites located around the old pomerium, or sacred boundary of the city. As any guide will tell you, these were meant exclusively as places of burial, and only later did the practice of conducting liturgies grow up around the graves of the martyrs. They were excavated and utilized for a little over two hundred years, from about A.D. 150 until the later fourth century.


CATACOMBS were "vast subterranean networks of galleries and chambers designed as cemeteries for burying the dead. 

 

Experts estimate that between 60 and 90 miles of galleries were dug by  professional fossores, who served as  both tunnelers and guides to visiting  families and pilgrims.  While actively in use between 500,000 and 750,000  Christian dead may have been buried in the loculi (niches),arcosolia  (sarcofaghi surmounted by an arch) and cubicula (family mausolea).  Many of these latter were decorated with frescoes on plaster depicting  a range of subjects, and this art is a most precious relic of the early  Christian community. What i like? the whole idea behind the catacombs was very innovative and safe they really saved alot of space and energy by utilizing very little space for something which required loads of space.