The Cemetery of the 366 Fossae (Cimitero delle 366 Fosse) or Cimitero di Santa Maria del Popolo or Cimitero dei Tredici was built in 1762 a short distance from the then-dilapidated Villa Poggio Reale, and is located on a terrace of a hill overlooking the Poggioreale neighborhood of Naples, Italy. It is near the monumental Cemetery of Poggioreale, which was built on top of the ruined villa. The architect was the Florentine Ferdinando Fuga.
The goal of the cemetery was to systematize the burial of the poor; those who died in Neapolitan orphanages, poorhouses such as the nearby Albergo dei Poveri (built in 1751 also by Fuga), and hospitals such as the Ospedale degli Incurabili . The rationale was intended to reconcile a mathematical logic with a pious compassion for the underclass. Confronted with the increasingly crowded city of Naples, as destitute peasants from the countryside moved into the city, the authorities had to find ways not only to house the masses alive, but also in proper Christian burial. Prior to the construction of this complex, the masses of dead were often buried in haphazard pits in rural or suburban areas of the capital. Thus some impetus for the project came from the desire to create efficiency in the disposal of corpses.
Fuga, under the regency of Ferdinand IV of Naples, designed this cemetery; it consists of a large square yard surrounded by high walls. Under the surface of the yard are 360 adjacent brick receptacles (4 meters square), seven meters deep (with a grate set two meters from the bottom), rectangular with an arched ceiling that opens at the surface to a narrow central square portal stone, 80 cm to each side, marked with a number from 1 to 360. The vaults are arrayed in such that each number corresponded to a specific day of the year, starting with January 1 as number one. Six more tombstones are inside the entrance building. The central spot is empty, and the vaults were arrayed in 19 rows and 19 columns. The numbers ascend from left to right in the first row, then right to left and so on. Thus each day corpses were deposited in the adjacent vault. One vault was reserved for the extra day of the leap year. On average, twenty five persons were deposited in a vault each day. [1] In 1794, after an earthquake, the numerous dead were buried in the less used leap year vault. The cemetery functioned from 1762 till 1890. It is presently in a semi-decrepit state. Based on calculations, it was likely the site for the burial of well over one hundred thousand persons. [2]
An iron winch is still on the premises, and is said to have assisted with lowering corpses. Prior to the invention of this machine in 1875, the corpses were unceremoniously dumped into the pits. [3]
The entrance with a skull and crossbones in the tympanum has a plaque announcing in Latin that, "The just and liberal king Ferdinand IV, of the kingdom of the two Sicilies built this common cemetery divided into individual cells for his beloved populace, in order to avoid the congestion of cadavers and their odors from harming his people, and to provide proper burial." [4]
Ultimately, a morbid fascination with catacombs (such as the Catacombs of San Gennaro and San Gaudioso) and the dead such as the skulls of Fontanelle cemetery, is not alien to the ultra-pious Catholicism of Naples. In this cemetery, that medieval religious requirement for proper burial encounters the rationalistic momentum of the Age of Enlightenment.
Catacombs are man-made underground passages primarily used for religious purposes, particularly for burial. Any chamber used as a burial place is considered a catacomb, although the word is most commonly associated with the Roman Empire.
A tomb or sepulcher is a repository for the remains of the dead. It is generally any structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber, of varying sizes. Placing a corpse into a tomb can be called immurement, although this word mainly means entombing people alive, and is a method of final disposition, as an alternative to cremation or burial.
The Sedlec Ossuary is a Roman Catholic chapel, located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints, part of the former Sedlec Abbey in Sedlec, a suburb of Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic. The ossuary is estimated to contain the skeletons of between 40,000 and 70,000 people, whose bones have, in many cases, been artistically arranged to form decorations and furnishings for the chapel. The ossuary is among the most visited tourist attractions of the Czech Republic, drawing over 200,000 visitors annually.
An ossuary is a chest, box, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years the skeletal remains are removed and placed in an ossuary. The greatly reduced space taken up by an ossuary means that it is possible to store the remains of many more people in a single tomb than possible in coffins. The practice is sometimes known as grave recycling.
The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy. Today they provide a somewhat macabre tourist attraction as well as an extraordinary historical record.
The Campo Verano is a cemetery in Rome, Italy, founded in the early 19th century. The monumental cemetery covers a surface area of 83 hectares which is currently divided into several sections: the main Catholic cemetery, the Jewish cemetery established in 1895, a Protestant section with its own entrance and a military section with monument to the victims of World War I.
Ferdinando Fuga was an Italian architect who was born in Florence, and is known for his work in Rome and Naples. Much of his early work was in Rome, notably, the Palazzo della Consulta (1732–7) at the Quirinal, the Palazzo Corsini (1736–54), the façade of the Santa Maria Maggiore (1741–3), and the Church of Sant'Apollinare (1742–8). He later moved to Naples and notably designed the Albergo de'Poveri (1751–81), the façade of the Church of the Gerolamini, and that of the Palazzo Giordano.
Poggioreale is a neighbourhood of Naples, southern Italy. It is at the extreme east end of the downtown Naples and includes the central train station, Centro Direzionale, Poggioreale prison, and the industrial area to the east.
The Catacombs of San Gennaro are underground paleo-Christian burial and worship sites in Naples, Italy, carved out of tuff, a porous stone. They are situated in the northern part of the city, on the slope leading up to Capodimonte, consisting of two levels, San Gennaro Superiore, and San Gennaro Inferiore. The catacombs lie under the Rione Sanità neighborhood of Naples, sometimes called the "Valley of the Dead". The site is now easily identified by the large church of Madre del Buon Consiglio.
The Fontanelle cemetery in Naples is a charnel house, an ossuary, located in a cave in the tuff hillside in the Materdei section of the city. It is associated with a chapter in the folklore of the city. By the time the Spanish moved into the city in the early 16th century, there was already concern over where to locate cemeteries, and moves had been taken to locate graves outside of the city walls. Many Neapolitans, however, insisted on being interred in their local churches. To make space in the churches for the newly interred, undertakers started removing earlier remains outside the city to the cave, the future Fontanelle cemetery. The remains were interred shallowly and then joined in 1656 by thousands of anonymous corpses, victims of the great plague of that year.
A burial vault is a structural stone or brick-lined underground tomb or 'burial chamber' for the interment of a single body or multiple bodies underground. The main difference between entombment in a subterranean vault and a traditional in-ground burial is that the coffin is not placed directly in the earth, but is placed in a burial chamber specially built for this purpose. A burial vault refers to an underground chamber, in contrast to an above-ground, freestanding mausoleum. These underground burial tombs were originally and are still often vaulted and usually have stone slab entrances. They are often privately owned and used for specific family or other groups, but usually stand beneath a public religious building, such as a church, or in a churchyard or cemetery. A crypt may be used as a burial vault and a freestanding mausoleum may contain a burial vault beneath the ground.
The English Cemetery, Il Cimitero degli Inglesi, or more correctly, Il Cimitero acattolico di Santa Maria delle Fede, is located near Piazza Garibaldi, Naples, Italy. It was the final resting place of many Swiss, Germans, Americans, Irish, Scottish and English who lived in Naples, were passing through on the Grand Tour, or were merchants or seamen.
The Monumental Cemetery of Bonaria is located in Cagliari, Sardinia. In use between 1829 and 1968, this monumental cemetery originally occupied an area at the base of the hill of Bonaria, and over time expanded upwards. The main entrance is located in Piazza Cimitero, with a second entrance in Ravenna, at the Basilica of Bonaria. Several famous people were buried in Bonaria, including the canonical archaeologist Giovanni Spano, the tenor Piero Schiavazzi and General Carlo Sanna.
Rione Sanità is a neighbourhood in Naples, part of the Stella quarter. It is located north of Naples' historical centre, adjacent to the Capodimonte hill.
The Cemetery of Poggioreale is one of the major cemeteries in Naples, Italy. It is also known as Camposanto Nuovo, to distinguish it from Camposanto Vecchio, which is now known as Cemetery of the 366 Fossae. It is bordered by the Largo Santa Maria del Pianto, Via del Riposo, Via Santa Maria del Pianto, and via nuova Poggioreale, and is built upon the ruins of Alphonso II's Villa Poggio Reale.
The Catacombs of Saint Gaudiosus are underground paleo-Christian burial sites, located in the northern area of the city of Naples.
The Poggio Reale villa or Villa Poggio Reale was an Italian Renaissance villa commissioned in 1487 by Alfonso II of Naples as a royal summer residence. The Italian phrase "poggio reale" translates to "royal hill" in English. The villa was designed and built by Giuliano da Maiano and located in the city of Naples, in the district now known as Poggioreale, between the present Via del Campo, Via Santa Maria del Pianto and the new and old Via Poggioreale. At the time it was built, a period when the capital city of the Kingdom of Naples was renowned for elegant homes with expansive vistas of the surrounding landscape and Mount Vesuvius, the villa was outside the city walls of Naples and was one of the most important architectural achievements of the Neapolitan Renaissance. Imitated, admired, robbed of its treasures by another king, left in ruins and partially destroyed, the summer palace of the King of Naples lives on in name as a style.
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The Catacombs of Domitilla are an underground Christian cemetery named after the Domitilla family that had initially ordered them to be dug. Located in Rome, Italy, are the human-made subterranean passageways used for cemeteries and religious practice. They are among the largest catacombs in Rome, spreading out 17 km, largely along the ancient Via Ardeatine, laid out on four levels, and housing approximately 15,000 bodies underground. The Catacombs of Domitilla are the only catacombs in Rome that have an underground Basilica and are of one only five Roman catacombs open to the public. Constructed during the second and third centuries, this labyrinth of underground passages contains frescoes and a wealth of Christian iconography while also presenting masterful engineering skills and innovative architectural techniques.
Naples (Italy) and its immediate surroundings preserve an archaeological heritage of inestimable value and among the best in the world. For example, the archaeological park of the Phlegraean Fields is directly connected to the centre of Naples through the Cumana railway, and the nearby sites of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Stabiae and Oplontis are among the World Heritage Sites of UNESCO.