Description
The Capuchin Museum and Crypt is one of the most unusual visits in Rome: beneath the church of Santa Maria della Concezione, on via Veneto, five small chapels are decorated with the bones of about four thousand friars. Skulls, shinbones and pelvises form arches, rosettes, hourglasses and butterflies. It is macabre, but for those who made it, it was the exact opposite.
The entrance bears this inscription: "What you are now we used to be; what we are now you will be." The meaning is that the body is only a container for the soul: when the soul has left it, it can be reused in another way, even as decoration. The bones were collected between 1528 and 1870 from the old Capuchin cemetery, near the Quirinal.
The route is a sequence of five chapels, linked by a corridor. Each has its own theme or its own part of the skeleton: shinbones, pelvises, skulls, three skeletons and the resurrection. Here and there, whole mummified friars in their habits, and on the ceiling the skeleton of a child holding a scale and a scythe.
Above the crypt is the church. It was commissioned by Pope Urban VIII Barberini for his brother Antonio, a Capuchin friar, whose tomb lies before the high altar. It was built between 1626 and 1631 to a design by Michele da Bergamo: a single nave with five chapels on each side, full of Baroque painting.
The most famous painting is Saint Michael the Archangel Vanquishing Lucifer by Guido Reni. According to his biographer Malvasia the devil has the face of Cardinal Pamphilj, the future Innocent X, who years earlier had thrown a spanner in the painter's works.
There are also a Nativity by Giovanni Lanfranco, Domenichino's Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata and the tomb of the Polish prince Alexander Sobieski, son of the conqueror of the Turks at Vienna: his presence was the only reason the complex was saved from demolition.
The museum, in the old sacristy, collects sacred objects and works linked to the Capuchins. The most precious piece is a Saint Francis in Meditation, attributed to Caravaggio.
The complex once stood in the countryside. The bell tower and the great convent were demolished after Unification, to open via Veneto and make room for a ministry; the convent was rebuilt next to the church in 1925.
Don't miss
• The five chapels of the crypt.
• The mummified friars.
• Guido Reni's Saint Michael.
• Saint Francis in Meditation.
Did you know?
• Similar ossuaries can be found in Milan, in Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic and in Évora, Portugal.
• The church holds the body of Felix of Cantalice and the tomb of Saint Crispin of Viterbo.
The entrance bears this inscription: "What you are now we used to be; what we are now you will be." The meaning is that the body is only a container for the soul: when the soul has left it, it can be reused in another way, even as decoration. The bones were collected between 1528 and 1870 from the old Capuchin cemetery, near the Quirinal.
The route is a sequence of five chapels, linked by a corridor. Each has its own theme or its own part of the skeleton: shinbones, pelvises, skulls, three skeletons and the resurrection. Here and there, whole mummified friars in their habits, and on the ceiling the skeleton of a child holding a scale and a scythe.
Above the crypt is the church. It was commissioned by Pope Urban VIII Barberini for his brother Antonio, a Capuchin friar, whose tomb lies before the high altar. It was built between 1626 and 1631 to a design by Michele da Bergamo: a single nave with five chapels on each side, full of Baroque painting.
The most famous painting is Saint Michael the Archangel Vanquishing Lucifer by Guido Reni. According to his biographer Malvasia the devil has the face of Cardinal Pamphilj, the future Innocent X, who years earlier had thrown a spanner in the painter's works.
There are also a Nativity by Giovanni Lanfranco, Domenichino's Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata and the tomb of the Polish prince Alexander Sobieski, son of the conqueror of the Turks at Vienna: his presence was the only reason the complex was saved from demolition.
The museum, in the old sacristy, collects sacred objects and works linked to the Capuchins. The most precious piece is a Saint Francis in Meditation, attributed to Caravaggio.
The complex once stood in the countryside. The bell tower and the great convent were demolished after Unification, to open via Veneto and make room for a ministry; the convent was rebuilt next to the church in 1925.
Don't miss
• The five chapels of the crypt.
• The mummified friars.
• Guido Reni's Saint Michael.
• Saint Francis in Meditation.
Did you know?
• Similar ossuaries can be found in Milan, in Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic and in Évora, Portugal.
• The church holds the body of Felix of Cantalice and the tomb of Saint Crispin of Viterbo.