Meggie Macdonald

In a surprise annoucement, the Vatican has revealed that an image in fresco of St Paul found in one of the catacombs of Rome could very easily be the oldest depiction of the saint ever discovered.  Found in the Catacomb of St Thekla, a fourth century martyr who was later made a saint, the fresco has been cleaned of some of the 1700 years of debris that has formed over top of it using special laser technology.

Barbara Mazzei, director of the work on the Catacombes, notes that, among other aspects of this unique image, the fact that St Paul is on his own and that the fresco was located so close to St Peter’s Basilica is significant.  At this time, much of the extant images of St Paul feature him alongside St Peter, since both Apostles were pivotal in the creation and development of the church and the propagation of Christian faith in the years after the death of Christ.

The fresco is likely dated to some time in the third century AD/CE.

In another announcement from Rome made this week, bone fragments from the Tomb of St Paul have undergone genetic testing that confirms (according to the Pope) that these are the remains of the Apostle Paul.  Paul was a Roman citizen born in Tarsus who converted to Christianity and, together with St Peter, took the Gospel to the citizen of the Roman world before his martyrdom in approximately 65 AD/CE.

In 2006, part of the sarcophagus was discovered under the altar believed to hold the remains of St Paul after they were moved from his original tomb on the Via Appia centuries ago.  Archaeologists and scientists have been able to study the remains in the tomb in great detail, including the human remains and evidence of the trappings of burial.

These two announcements should be considered profound developments in the history of the Christian Church during the early Roman Empire, and of the history of one of it’s most powerful Apostles.