The bones of long-dead Capuchin monks are painstakingly displayed in a crypt beneath the Church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception
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Death stares at me. He has no eyes, only hollow sockets, but I know he can see me. With no more than ten feet between us, Death stands motionless, clad in a dirty, dusty hooded cloak. Under the hood, I can make out a grinning skull.
It's early December and on this crisp morning in Rome I'm walking down Via Veneto, one of the city's most elegant streets. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, this was the nerve center of la dolce vita , brought to the screen by the Italian director Federico Fellini in iconic masterpiece of the same name. But I'm not here to get a taste of the sweet life. If this were a movie, the title would be La Dolce Morte. The sweet death.
At 27 Via Veneto is the Chiesa di Santa Maria Immacolata, or Church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. Rome is home to more churches than New York City has Starbucks, but this isn't just any church. It is a historic church of the Capuchins, a Catholic order founded in the 16th century. Its monks are faithful in their dedication to living the Gospel. They dress exclusively in brown tunics and take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
Below the church is a crypt where nearly 4,000 monks have been laid to rest. They are not neatly buried under tombstones. Instead, their skeletons adorn the walls and ceilings, like three-dimensional paintings. Even the elaborate chandeliers are made of bone.
I am far from the first traveler who came to Rome to see this crypt with his own eyes. It is estimated that over 200,000 visitors come each year. And they follow in the footsteps of famous tourists. THE Marquis de Sade he visited in 1775. He commented that "I have never seen anything so impressive", high praise from a man who wrote violent pornography. A French prodigal, Sade lived such a depraved life that the word "sadism" was coined after him. Almost a century later, in 1867, a budding American writer appeared in the crypt. "Here was a spectacle for sensitive nerves!" Mark Twain exclaimed, impressed by his "pictures of horror."
The crypt has lost none of its mystery since Twain was here. But today, visitors must first travel through a museum. According to Esmeralda Shahinas, the museum's head of operations, the entrance fees to the museum and the crypt help fund the different missions of the Capuchins around the world. He explains that "a large part of the proceeds goes to them and also to the maintenance of the works of art in the church."
The museum recaps the history of the Capuchins, filled with artefacts – including rosaries and instruments of penance – and an original painting by Caravaggio, St. Francis in Meditation , depicting the patron Saint of the Capuchins dressed in chiaroscuro or contrasts of light and shadow; he looks peaceful holding a skull.
The artwork reflects the Capuchin approach to death. For them, since eternal life awaits all those who accept Christ, it is not something they fear, but rather embrace. Therein lies the true purpose of the crypt: to make people comfortable with mortality. Other Capuchin crypts, pPalermo of Italy and in Vienna , serve the same purpose. But the one in Rome is the most impressive—and still in use, too. Shahinas says it continues to be "a place of prayer." Every year on All Souls' Day (November 2), the Capuchin monks hold Mass down there.
The museum, which opened the 2012 , attempts to explain the shrouded mystery of how the crypt was constructed. The year was 1624, and the Capuchin order was flourishing. The time had come for larger headquarters. An eminent Capuchin, Cardinal Antonio Marcello Barberini, turned for help to his older brother, who happened to be Pope Urban VIII. The Holy Father gave Barberini a plot of prime real estate in Rome to build a new church. He even came to the construction site to bless the foundation stone.
The imposing building was completed in 1631. A question arose: What to do with the remains of the clergy who were buried in the old Capuchin monastery? It was decided to dig them up and hide them in a chamber under the new church. For more than a century, Capuchin monks from all over the world were buried there.
Then, in the mid-18th century, someone decided to get creative and the crypt was made to look like it does today. Investigators don't know for sure who was responsible. According to Roman tradition, the mastermind was a brilliant artist who had committed a horrible crime and found a safe haven among the Capuchins. Toiling for this macabre shrine was his way of asking God for forgiveness. Tempting as it is, this story seems improbable. A more plausible case has been made by Rinaldo Cordovani, a Capuchin friar and historian. "It is possible," he writes in the museum brochure, "that the present arrangement is the work of one of the Capuchin artists who were usually present at the monastery, assisted by various craftsmen, also monks."
But who could this capuchin artist be? The Marquis de Sade, of all people, may hold the key. In his travel diaries, He wrote that "a German priest ... made [the] sepulchral monument." Cordovani believes Sand was talking about a Viennese Capuchin named Norbert Baumgartner who spent time in Rome in the 18th century. If so, Baumgartner deserves to be known as a masterful artist.
Because that's what this crypt is after all: a work of art. And like all great works of art, it tells a compelling story. It's something that speaks to the essence of the human experience, which it is transience. As he puts it the Book of Genesis: "For dust you are, and to dust you shall return."
This line echoes in my head as I enter the crypt. It is divided into six niches, next to which runs a narrow corridor dotted with windows.
The first alcove sets my pulse racing: The skeletal remains of a Capuchin monk, holding a wooden cross, recall the popular image of the Grim Reaper. Elsewhere, striking patterns compete for my eye's attention: a door frame made of bones and vertebrae, a fake clock made of toe and toe bones, and a skull from which two wings emerge. Most painful of all, on the ceiling, I see the skeleton of a child. It is said to be that of an infant from the Barberini family.
The other alcoves are equally spectacular. Capuchin skeletons were lying on layers of bones. The pelvises connect with the shoulder blades to form rosettes and the jawbones are arranged in triangles. Skulls are piled on top of skulls on top of more skulls. Everywhere, there is something to consider. Some compositions have inner meanings. Take, for example, the two arm bones attached to the wall in the shape of a cross. One of these arms is covered by the sleeve of the Capuchin tunic. According to Cordovani, this is intended to refer to the "Franciscan coat of arms", in which the arm of Christ and the arm of Saint Francis are intertwined.
The craftsmanship is so intricate, so precise—every bone is just the right shape, just the right size—that I begin to imagine what it must have been like to put this ossuary together. It must have been painstaking digging through piles of bones to locate the perfect piece for each pattern.
But there is more than a good scare from this place. A sign in one of the alcoves spells it out honestly. It is a message from the monks to us, from the past to the present, from the dead to the living: “What you are now we were. what we are now you will be."
The crypt is what is known as a memento mori (Latin for "remember you will die"), a physical reminder that life is finite and that we all have an appointment with Death. Your appointment could be tomorrow or 80 years from now. Either way, you won't be able to escape it. It is written in your diary in invisible but indelible ink.
What should you do about this stark, inescapable truth? Pretend to forget it and live in denial? Or, if existentialism is up your alley, let it drive you to despair? Neither seems like a wise choice.
The Capuchin Crypt shows that there is another, better approach. It came to me suddenly as I entered the last two alcoves. First is a small marble chapel. Above the altar hangs a painting depicting the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child saving souls from purgatory . Then, in the next alcove, surrounded by skulls and bones, hangs a painting of a biblical scene: Christ Rises Lazarus from the dead. The message comes through loud and clear. After death will come resurrection.
I'm not even a Christian, but I find there is a huge life lesson to be learned here anyway. Facing your own mortality is terrifying. It's like dying a little in your head. However, if you do it intentionally, something miraculous happens. You experience life anew, even momentarily, and feel grateful that you just you are alive right now.
Like Lazarus, I find myself resurrected.
The Museum and Crypt of the Capuchin monks located at Via Veneto 27, Rome .
Source: smithsonianmag