Church of the Capuchins in Rome. Unique and intimidating church in rome

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Santa Maria della Concezione) belongs to the order of the Capuchins. With her, a small Capuchin Museum(Museo dei cappuccini), but the main attraction of the church is the crypt, the interior of which is made of bones.

Church of Santa Maria della Concecione

The Church of Santa Maria della Concezione was built thanks to Cardinal Antonio Barberini, a member of the Capuchin order. His brother, Pope Urban VIII, consecrated the first stone of the new building on October 4, 1626, the day of St. Francis, and the first service in the temple took place on September 8, 1630. The project of the church was carried out by the architect of the pontiff Michele de Bergamo, also a member of the Capuchin order, who supervised the construction and left detailed descriptions of the process.

It is the first Roman church dedicated to "God in honor of the blessed Virgin Mary". The church belongs to a group of Franciscan monks. They live in a nearby monastery, rebuilt from 1928 to 1933, after the old building from 1631 was demolished to open Via Veneto and build the Ministry of Corporations. Like all churches of the Capuchin order, there are no side aisles in it, high side chapels are made, closed with wooden doors. Only the central altar is made of marble.

Ossuary

The ossuary, or ossuary, is a special room intended for the storage of bone remains. In some Catholic monasteries, it is not customary to remove the bones of monks in special coffins or boxes, they are kept openly, in crypts or chapels.

The most famous chapel of this kind is Kutna Hora in the Czech Republic, but it was built under the impression of the Roman church of Santa Maria della Concecione.

The crypt of this church has five chapels, the walls and ceilings of which are decorated with intricate ornaments from the bones of Capuchin monks, whose remains were removed from burials in the 17th century. Here the monks descended in the evenings to pray before going to bed and to meditate.

Memento, Quiapulvises“Remember that you are dust.”

Museo e Cripta dei Cappuccini

• Church address: Via Vittorio Veneto, 27
• Opening hours: daily 7 - 12 / 15 - 19.
• Sundays and holidays: 9:00 - 19:00
• A visit to the ossuary is part of a visit to the museum.
• Closed December 25, January 1, Easter.
• Ticket: €8.50, under 18s or over 65s €5.00.
• Audio guide €4.00, 2 audio guides €6.00

Upon returning from Rome, I try to figure out what I saw, while it is still fresh in my memory. Before - there was simply no time and we walked on our own, with a map and without guides. And it's like the puzzle is coming together. Here we will talk about a not quite touristy place - the crypt of the Capuchins Church of Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini. Simply put, about the cemetery of the monks of the order under the church, the entrance to which is through the museum, with a painting by Caravaggio, by the way. How do you like that? The spectacle is not for the faint of heart, but we are not. It's about philosophy, not anatomy.

I do not treat all this as some kind of strawberry or panopticon, although it looks somewhat unusual ... You can just try to understand)

http://mozplan.ru/rim-santa-mariya-della-konchecione/
In one of the halls there is an inscription: "We were what you are now, you will become what we are." The Capuchins treated death with respect, but lightly, and they did this not to desecrate the remains of their dead brothers, but to show the world that death should not be feared. So they wanted to pass on their faith, the memory of themselves and the idea of ​​life and death to their descendants, to us who live now. Those monks who died after creating this crypt with its silent contents are interred here in the cells of the crypt. Their graves are decorated with small crosses with simple wooden planks attached to them.

Location in Rome Via Vittorio Veneto, 27, near Piazza Barberini. Get to the Barberini metro station on the red line A.
At the top of the church itself, admission is free. The museum is lower, the entrance is paid and photography is prohibited - a rare thing in Rome, but what we just didn’t climb.

Now the church is being renovated, the furniture has been dumped, covered with cellophane and building materials are laid out along the corridors. It’s just possible to shoot in the church, but there was nothing to do since such a thing.

The main hall is only in front view. And only now I realized - it was Sunday, at that time we went around several churches and mass was going on everywhere. And it's empty here. Capuchins are special in everything

The museum is interesting. A bunch of different stuff. For example, the books published by the monks of the order are interesting - prayer books and biographies, with a good font and binding. A lot of holy relics - under glass, as they used to wear strands dear people, capuchins keep tiny fragments of relics and blood. There is also a painting by Caravaggio depicting a meditating monk with a skull in his hand.
The museum ends with a crypt.

Crypt (from other Greek κρυπτή - covered underground passage, cache) - in medieval Western European architecture, one or more underground vaulted rooms located under the altar and choral parts of the temple and serving for burial and exposure for veneration of the relics of saints and martyrs. Another name for the crypt is the “lower” church.

Here's what I've gathered from the internet.
After the construction of the church, the bones of the monks buried there were transferred from the old cemetery of the Capuchin Order, located in the area of ​​the Trevi Fountain, and placed in the crypt of the church. Gradually some of them were fulfilled decorative ornaments all six rooms of the crypt. The interiors of the chapels are decorated with human bones. Arches are built of skulls, picture frames, pilasters, lamps are made of bones. Patterns are laid out of small bones, and skeletons are placed in the niches of the walls, dressed in brown cloaks with pointed hoods - the traditional attire of capuchins. The bodies on display in the crypt belonged to monks who died between 1528 and 1870. In total, the bones of four thousand monks are collected in the crypt. FROM late XIX centuries, burials in the church are not made.

The church for the monastic order of the Capuchins was built by order of Pope Urban XIII in 1626. To crypto new church it was decided to transfer the remains of thousands of capuchins from the former monastery. Earth was brought from Jerusalem to bury the bodies in the crypt. The monk's body was buried in the ground, and after some time (approximately 30 years), during which the soft tissues were supposed to decay, it was exhumed. The surviving bones were used to decorate the chapels of the crypt. Thanks to this treatment of the remains of the monks, it was possible to place about four thousand bodies of the deceased in the crypt.

Photos are not mine, found in the bottomless internet. And judging by the quality of the shooting, they were made secretly.

In the fifth hall of the crypt, there is the skeleton of Princess Barberini, niece of Pope Sixtus V, who died in childhood. A square in Rome is named after her, located between the crypt and the fountain di Trevi, where the princess's palace was located.

This site has a couple of articles about the catacombs of Rome, which are located at a considerable distance from the city center and are an interesting archaeological site for tourists.

Now we will not talk about the ancient catacombs, but about a kind of museum, well, or a cemetery-museum, which is arranged specially, not for tourists, of course, but for all living things. The main goal of this museum is a reminder of the frailty of being and our only temporary presence on this piece of stone called Earth.

So, the museum and the crypt of the Capuchins.

First of all, it is worth saying who the capuchins are.

capuchins are small monastic order Franciscans (followers of St. Francis), who separated back in 1525 in order to most fully follow the precepts of St. Francis. The name of the order comes from the word hood, which is an integral part of the clothes of monks. This is important, mainly because the monk's tunic and sandals are his only property.

Thus, the Capuchin order has existed since 1525, and today it is one of the most famous religious orders not only in Italy, but also in the world. Many famous people from among the Capuchins, these are travelers and missionaries, diplomats, politicians, writers, artists, musicians, artisans and even firefighters, military priests. Interesting fact- Capuchins wear beards.

In Rome, the Capuchins have their own church, a monastery attached to it, a museum and a crypt. All this is located at Via Vittorio Veneto, 27, i.е. in the historical part of the city, almost in the center of Rome. Main entrance to the church, museum and crypt of the Capuchins.

If you look at the map, you will see the Church of Santa Maria della Concezione (Chiesa di Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini) at this address. The church was built in 1630 by Cardinal Antonio Barberini, a very famous and wealthy man who was also a Capuchin. The church is located in close proximity to the Barberini Palace and the square of the same name. And this is the first church in Rome, built in honor of the Immaculate Conception, completely managed by the Capuchin monks living at the neighboring monastery.

The Capuchin Museum is located on the territory of the monastery, it consists of eight rooms, each of which sanctifies the history of the Capuchin order. Including there are items of everyday life of monks and much of what has been preserved since the founding of the order.

The most important exposition of the Capuchin Museum is the Crypt, a work of art created at the beginning of the 18th century. The entrance to the Krypt is preceded by an ominous inscription “What you are - we were; what we are, you will be."

The crypt consists of 5 small chapels, the interior of which is decorated with the remains of Capuchin monks who died in different years. Most of the remains were moved to this crypt after being exhumed from the nearby Capuchin cemetery. The crypt originated precisely as a place where the remains can be placed in order to make room in a small cemetery.

In total, the crypt contains the remains of about 4,000 monks who lived at different times. There is a legend that the remains of monks, brought from Palestine and even Jerusalem, are also placed in the crypt. A very shocking effect is the fact that all the bones, down to the smallest ones, were used to decorate the Crypt.

It is worth noting that the museum and the crypt of the Capuchins are not recommended for people with a weak psyche and minors. If you find yourself in Piazza Barberini in Rome, stop by to visit this unique complex, which is over 500 years old. The Barberini metro station is just located on this square.

September 30, 2018

On one of the central streets of Rome, not far from Piazza Barberini, there is a small church called Santa Maria della Concezione. Few people know what lies behind its inconspicuous facade. This is one of the few attractions Eternal City visiting which is not recommended for people with a weak psyche and children. The Crypt of the Capuchins, decorated with thousands of monastic skeletons, evokes mixed feelings.

The church itself, located on Via Veneto, was built in the middle of the 17th century in the vicinity of Palazzo Barberini by Pope Urban VIII, in honor of his brother, Cardinal Antonio Barberini, a monk of the Capuchin Order. Santa Maria della Concezione keeps a large number of works of art by the great masters of past centuries, but the real treasure of the church is the crypt located under it.

Decor from human skeletons

Hic jacet pulvis, cinis et nihil Here rests dust, ashes and nothing more

The Capuchin Crypt is a small cloister with four chapels decorated with the bones of more than 4,000 Capuchin brothers who died between 1528 and 1870. The remains of the monks were exhumed and transferred from the nearby cemetery of the Order of the Capuchins.

Before entering the crypt, you can see the inscription: “What you are - we were; what we are, you will be.” A little creepy, but it's true. Going down, you can see a long narrow corridor, to the right of which there are small chapels where the remains of the Capuchin brothers are buried. Some of them can be recognized directly from the inscriptions. For example, three small skeletons are the prematurely deceased grandchildren of Pope Urban VIII, and the skeleton with a scythe and scales decorating the ceiling is Princess Barberini.

The gloominess of the room is given by its unusual decorative design, made in the rococo style and realized entirely from an incalculable number of bones. different parts body. The vaults and walls of the crypt are decorated with floral ornaments, rosettes, flowers, pilasters and stars made from carefully selected stones of different sizes. Surprisingly, here even lamps and candlesticks are made from human remains.

The names of the crypts correspond to the names of the bones used for their decoration: the crypt of the skulls, pelvic bones, tibias and femurs.

Until now, there is no consensus as to what could serve as a motive for creating such an unusual cemetery. Some suggest that the Capuchin brothers thus wanted to remind the living of the frailty of the body and the transience of human life.

The Church of Santa Maria della Concezione is located at via Veneto, 27. The easiest way to get here is by metro: Barberini station.