Abbazia delle Tre Fontane, Rome

New Superiors Seminar, Rome Jan-Feb 2011

In-service training and appropriate learning from the Eternal City.

The venue for the Seminar was in the neighbourhood of the Cistercian (Trappist) monastery of Tre Fontane.

It was an excellent opportunity to visit the Abbey. 

The Abbot welcomed the international representative group. 

Mark succeeeded in having a fine collection of photos and this is easily augmented from the The Abbazia delle Tre Fontane Website:
http://www.abbaziatrefontane.it/index.php  

 The Abbey

 Cloister Garth

Library

From memory I am mystified by two Chapels, near to the monastery.

The Website provides information on these two sanctuaries below.

Abbazia delle Tre Fontane - Chiesa del Martirio di San Paolo

Church of the Martyrdom of St. Paul Open: 8.00 to 13.00, from 15.00 to 18.00 (winter) or 19.00 (summer). Confessions: Saturday: 16:30 to 17:30 - Sunday: 11:00 to 12:00 S. Mass: Saturday 17.00, Sunday 11.30. Phone: 06 540 39 96. To get to St. Paul's Church must take a short tree-lined avenue, which it leaves behind the church of Saints Vincent and Anastasius and Santa Maria Scala Coeli. This is the church dedicated to the martyrdom of St. Paul and is the highest and most sacred historic and spiritual significance of the Abbey of Tre Fontane. Even in this case the history of mankind has led to a stratification of a building built on the ruins of the other, the last of which dates back to 1599, when it was pulled down the old existing building and built in its place the work of Giacomo della port commissioned by Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini. The external facade of the church of San Paolo is an alternation of brick and travertine used for the decorative elements of the portal, cornices and capitals. Two statues overlook the gable of the facade: those of St. Peter and St. Paul, made from "Franciosini" sculptor of Lorraine, whose real name was Nicolas Cordier, who, between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, he worked for the Vatican . Also St. Peter and St. Paul are the subjects of these two reliefs on the side walls of the vestibule, immediately after entering, the area that corresponds to the ancient oratory. The two works were donated by Pope Pius IX, the first in memory of the eighteenth centenary of the death of the Apostle, the second in memory of the defeat of Garibaldi's troops, November 3, 1867, by papal dell'esecito ("in memoriam victoriae to Nomentum). The floor of the vestibule is partly occupied by a mosaic, existing at the time of construction of the church and was left where it was. High up in the lunette above the door, past the marble plaque commemorating the name of the purchaser of the work, Cardinal Aldobrandini at the time of the papacy of Clement VIII, is represented in the burial of St. Paul on the Via Ostiense, in a seal of the matron Lucina, where there will be then built the basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.  From the vestibule you enter the nave, cross over the entrance, with two chapels on the sides and the apse at the center. On the floor was placed a Roman mosaic discovered in Ostia Antica near Mitreo the Imperial Palace, it dates from the second century AD and is dedicated to the Four Seasons, it bears the inscriptions: VER (spring) - AESTAS (Summer) - AUTU ( MNUS) (autumn) - HIEMS (winter). It was donated to the church by Pope Pius IX. The two altars of the chapels are topped with paintings, one on the left, on the altar dedicated to St. Peter, represents the copy of the "Crucifixion" by Guido Reni (1575-1642) whose original is kept in the Pinacoteca Vaticana, after the French had brought to Paris as a result of the Treaty of Tolentino (February 19, 1797) and then returned in 1815, the altar of the right is dedicated to St. Paul and is surmounted by the blade of the beheading, by the Bolognese Passarotti Bartholomew (1529 - 1592). Both paintings are topped by pediments supported by columns of precious marble. On the left of the altar of St. Paul, the column is truncated where tradition has been linked during the Apostle's martyrdom. The three fountains are aligned along the wall of the nave, at equal distance from each other but at different level from the floor, arranged in niches in niche. The sources, closed since 1950, are surmounted by shrines designed by the door, in black marble columns of Chios, which support timpani arc basin with marble and each shrine was adorned with a bas-relief depicting the head of Nicolas Cordier Apostle: unfortunately we can no longer enjoy because stolen. Behind the shrine of the central source on the wall of the apse, representing the martyrdom of St. Paul on this, in the basin, there is the "Glory of the Apostle," interpret the description of the revelations of Santa Maria d'Oigny , that the soul of St. Paul was presented to the SS. Trinity by the martyr Stephen. Above, in the lunette, a fresco depicting St. Paul at Caesarea before Porcius Festus, the Roman governor said that the appeal of all'Impertore saying: "Appellasti to Caesar, to Caesar you shall go." That this is the place where St. Paul was martyred is a large marble plaque to testify; mail on the lintel of the external front, it gives the building to the cardinal and Aldobrandini bears the inscription: "Site of the martyrdom of St. Paul where three sources miraculously gushed "According to ancient tradition, the apostle here was taken June 29 to 67 be beheaded. His head, took off, jumped to the ground three times and on those three points three sources of water miraculously gushed. Certainly, the story includes a series of real events, documented by numerous archaeological findings and historical documentation. An Act apocryphal, probably added later, contains the description of the martyrdom of St. Paul and the miracle: "Explaining the veil of Plautilla is bandaged his eyes, leaned both his knees on the ground and handed the head, that quickly with a large blow severed, was heard by all pronounce loudly for three times in the Hebrew language, the lovely name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and at the same time from the neck and head of the Apostle spurted a 'wave of milk on the executioner's robes and the earth. " The document also states that the waters were the site of the martyrdom Hi, the shade of an ancient pine tree. In fact, excavations in 1878 confirmed the presence of a pine forest in the area: "In very deep cupping practiced a few feet away from the scene of the beheading, present credible witnesses, were found many cones that the effects of time and chemical reactions of the soil had almost fossilized, three well logs of pine and a certain amount of coins from the times of Nero. "Also, previously, GB de Rossi, during another excavation, identified the remains of a church and a number of inscriptions that revealed the presence of a cemetery area near the church of Santa Maria Scala Coeli; other findings by the end of seventh century gave evidence of the presence of a chapel in memory of the Apostle who was restored or rebuilt by Pope Sergius I in 689, it consisted of a hall that led into two chapels, which contained the sacred springs - two in a chapel and a in the other. http://www.sanpaolotrefontane.org/

hurch of Santa Maria Scala Coeli

Open: 8.00 to 13.00, from 15.00 to 18.00 (winter) or 19.00 (summer). S. Mass: Monday to Friday: 16.30. In 1138 San Bernardo, in the place where today stands the church of Santa Maria Scala Coeli, while he was celebrating a Mass for the dead, in the presence of Pope Innocent II, had a vision in a trance, he saw a stairway that, in a continual coming and going, the Angels led the liberated souls to heaven from purgatory. This event comes from the name given to the Church, the smallest of the three in the abbey. In principle, the name "Scala Coeli" was given to the existing church oratory, in turn, allegedly built on the ruins of a pagan temple in memory of the martyrdom of San Zeno and the legionnaires' Christians.  The current church building, brick and travertine, dates back to the sixteenth century, the work was started in 1582 by Giacomo della Porta, on commission of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, and ended in 1584, when Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini was the successor to Cardinal Farnese following his death.  The church is octagonal, surmounted by a dome and a lantern, the facade is complemented by a tympanum and an eye placed in a lunette, also you can see, added to the ledge left of the façade with a piece of marble pluteus inscription dating from the ninth century. The lintel of the door reads, between the emblems of the Farnese, under a small gable, the word "Scala Coeli" Inside there are three apses with their altars. The right one is dedicated to San Zeno and the Roman soldiers martyred, there was a canvas for decoration, author unknown, but it was stolen. Yet instead of the canvas (again by an unknown author) of the central altar, one at the front entrance of the church and dedicated to SS. Virgin. The left apse contains an altar dedicated to St. Bernard and embellished by two columns with Corinthian capitals and a shovel Desiderio de Angelis in depicting the scene of the vision of the saint. The Florentine Francesco Zucchi, designed by Giovanni de Vecchi, is the author of the fine mosaic, executed in 1591, decorating the vault of the church, the composition is a Madonnna and Child surrounded by St. Bernard, St. Clement and Robert of Molesmes VIII - right - and - left - from St. Vincent, and Cardinal Sant'Anastasio Aldobrandini.  The floor of this chapel had been decorated, but now the ancient mosaic of Cosmati work of the school, there are only a few tracks together with a fragment of an inscription dating from the third Christian century.  Below is the crypt, which houses an altar dedicated to San Zeno century martyrs and soldiers, on whose sides two windows allowing a glimpse - left - a small altar dedicated to the pagan goddess and Dia - right - a corner where, according to tradition, St. Paul was imprisoned before decapitation. Of the two frescoes representing a San Zeno and the other soldiers and martyrs St. Paul in prison, only one is left. The church also houses the remains of the Cistercian Ferdinando Ughelli, abbot of the monastery, who died in 1670, was famous for having built the monumental nine-volume "Sacred Italy, built between 1644 and 1662, the history of the Italian episcopal sees.  The church is a plaque which says that Giacomo della Porta has acted on the basis of designs of Vignola: the information is not documented, however, at the time of the construction of the church door was considered the most important architect of the Vatican , and contributed his