Diario di: Redazione GoTellGo
Autore: Ada Cioffarelli
Goteller: Redazione GoTellGo
Categoria: archeologia
Creato il: 30/05/2010
Data Da: 15/03/1993
Data A: 15/03/1993
Licenza:
Nazioni: Italy
: roma
Posti visitati: Chiesa di Santa Passera

The church was dedicated to the Alexandrian martyrs Cyrus and John, killed in Canopus during Diocletian's persecutions, and built on the conspicuous remains of a Roman burial monument dating to the end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 3rd century a.D.

There are many uncertain and contrasting versions of the story of how the saints' relics were brought to Rome from Menouthis (nox Abukir) where they had been kept in the church of the Holy Evangelists. 

According to one legend, told by Gualtiero at the start of the 13th century, the bodies of the two martyrs were brought to Rome by the monks Grimoladus and Arnolfus in 407 and placed in the little church on the via Portuensis, on an estate belonging to the widow Theodora where a relic of St. Praxedes was already preserved. But when the patriarch Sophronius wrote the story of the two saints in 610-620, their mortal remains were certainly still in Menouthis and while, on the one hand, Pietro da Napoli, around the year 1000 believed their remains were still in Alexandria in Egypt, a passege of Giovanni Diacono (10th-11th century) regarding the life of St. Gregory, seems to allude to the existence of the Church of Saints Cyrus and John as early as the 7th century. And so it is likely that from a date which it is impossible to establish some relics atrributed to the two martyrs were kept in the little church at the Magliana.

The building with the apse on the Via della Magliana Nuova faces east, towards the Tiber. It was built in various stage, and is on three levels consisting in the upper church with adjoining sacristy, some semi-hypogeal rooms and a completely underground area. 

The church, which probably dates back to the 9th century, has a small square in front of it which is reached by two flights of steps.

The façade still has part of the funeral mausoleum wall in brick-work up to a certain height.

The interior has a nave with an apse facing west, raised by one step; the sloping roof had wooden beams.

The norther wall was destroyed by the explosion of the Monteverde powder store in 1891, and then rebuilt in modern times.

The apse and the archway were decorated with frescoes, now badly damaged and ruind by a 17th century painting which was put over them, but they are known from drawings of Cassiano Dal Pozzo's collection.

In the apse we can see two orders of painting, with Christ imparting a blessing with his right hand and a roll in his left hand in the semi-dome. The figure is between two palms, still parly visible, and is flanked by four smaller sized saints: on the right we see a bearded St. Peter, on the left St. Paul holding a sword and a roll, while on the fair right stands St. Jogn the Evangelist holding a chalice.

On the opposite site, it is just possible to make out St. John the Baptist holding a medaillon depicting the Lamb.

There are two different scenes in the frescoes of the second order: the Virgin sitting on a throne with the Child, and, faded, the Archabgel Michael with a dragon at his feet.  On the left of the Virgin there are two saints.The Saviour is seated on a throne in the center of the second scene imparting a blessing  and flanked by the saints to whom the church id dedicated.

The frescoes in the apsidal arch are also in very poor condition: among then a very beautiful image of St. Praxedes.

These paintings, painted by different artists, would seem to date to 12th-13th century.

On the church's souther wall we can see the remains of much older frescoes (IX century), divided into panels: see the figures of five saints in Byzantins style.

From the Vicolo di Santa Passera, passing thorugh a service room, we come to the semi-hypogeum floor, most of which belongs to the Roman funeral monument and is irregularly divided into four rooms which communicate by means of central passages. 

In the small square in front of the church you can see two marble funeral altars.

To know more read: Via Portuense, via Campana, Roma: Bonsignori, 1993, p. 27-40.