Monday, 10 March 2014

Lenten Station At Saint Peter Ad Vincula (Saint Peter's Chains). Monday, First Week In Lent.


Roman Text is taken from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal.

Italic Text, Illustrations and Captions, are taken from Wikipedia - the free encyclopaedia,
unless otherwise stated.


Indulgence of 10 years and 10 Quarantines.
Violet Vestments.


File:San pietro in vincoli 051218-01.JPG

English: Church of Saint Peter's Chains, Rome.
Italiano: San Pietro in Vincoli.
Latin: San Pietro ad Vincula.
Photo: December 2005.
Source: Own work.
Author: Lalupa
(Wikimedia Commons)


San Pietro in Vincoli (Italian) (Saint Peter in Chains) is a Roman Catholic titular Church and Minor Basilica in Rome. It is also known as the home of Michelangelo's statue of Moses, part of the tomb of Pope Julius II. Two Popes were elected in this Church: Pope John II (533 A.D.) and Pope Gregory VII (1073).


File:Roma san pietro in vincoli catene.jpg

English: The Chains of Saint Peter in the "Basilica di San Pietro in Vincoli" in Rome.
Italiano: Le catene di San Pietro, conservate nella Basilica di San Pietro in Vincoli a Roma.
Photo: August 2008.
Source: Own work.
Author: Original photo by Raja Patnaik, 
post-processed and uploaded by Alessio Damato
(with permission of the author).
(Wikimedia Commons)


The Station is in one of the most ancient Roman Basilicas, built by the Empress Eudocia, where the chains worn by the Prince of the Apostles, to whom Jesus confided His flock, are kept. In the 5th-Century, it was one of the twenty-five Parishes of Rome. 


File:Sanpietroinvincoli.jpg

English: San Pietro in Vincoli's Apse.
Italiano: Abside di San Pietro in Vincoli a Roma.
Photo: March 2010.
Source: Own work.
Author: Goldmund100
(Wikimedia Commons)


The Epistle (of the day), alluding to the penitents about to be reconciled at Easter and to the Catechumens preparing for Baptism, says that the Lord is the Shepherd who comes to seek His lost sheep. And the Gospel tells of the separation that this Shepherd will make for ever between the sheep and the goats, or between the good, who repent and give themselves up to works of Charity, and the sinners (this Prophecy was spoken by Jesus to His Apostles on the Mount of Olives, on the evening of the Tuesday preceding His death). 

Let us ask God to prepare us by “this Lenten Fast” (Collect) “to be loosened from the bonds of our sins” (the Prayer over the people) by virtue of the power of Peter, who was delivered from his chains.


File:San pietro in vincoli, esterno.JPG

English: Basilica of Saint Peter's Chains,
Rome, Italy.
Italiano: San Pietro in Vincoli,
Roma, Italy.
Photo: 3 April 2013.
Source: Own work.
Author: sailko.
(Wikimedia Commons)


San Pietro in Vincoli (Saint Peter in Chains) is a Roman Catholic Titular Church and Minor Basilica in Rome, Italy, best known for being the home of Michelangelo's statue of Moses, part of the tomb of Pope Julius II.

Also known as the Basilica Eudoxiana, it was first rebuilt on older foundations in 432 A.D. – 440 A.D., to house the Relic of the Chains that bound Saint Peter, when he was imprisoned in Jerusalem, the episode called the Liberation of Saint Peter.

The Empress Eudoxia (wife of Emperor Valentinian III), who received them as a gift from her mother, Aelia Eudocia, consort of Valentinian II, presented the Chains to Pope Leo I. Aelia Eudocia had received these Chains as a gift from Iuvenalis, Bishop of Jerusalem.

According to legend, when Pope Leo, while comparing them to the Chains of Saint Peter's final imprisonment in the Mamertine Prison in Rome, the two Chains miraculously fused together. The Chains are kept in a Reliquary under the High Altar in the Basilica.




File:SPIV small-2.jpg

English: The interior of San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome.
Deutsch: San Pietro in Vincoli, Gesamtansicht des Innenraums.
Photo: 20 May 2012.
Source: This file was derived from:
Author: SPIV_small.jpg: Philippos. Derivative work: Rabanus Flavus.
(Wikimedia Commons)



The Basilica, consecrated in 439 A.D., by Pope Sixtus III, has undergone several restorations, among them a restoration by Pope Adrian I, and further work in the 11th-Century. From 1471 to 1503, in which year he was elected Pope Julius II, Cardinal Della Rovere, the nephew of Pope Sixtus IV, effected notable rebuilding. 

The front Portico, attributed to Baccio Pontelli, was added in 1475. The Cloister (1493–1503) has been attributed to Giuliano da Sangallo. Further work was done at the beginning of the 18th-Century, under Francesco Fontana, and there was also a renovation in 1875.



File:Sanpietroin cerro1.jpg

English: The internal Courtyard of Saint Peter ad Vincula
(Saint Peter's Chains),
Rome, Italy.
Italiano: vista di parte del cortile interno.
Photo: 21 June 2008.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)




The Titulus S. Petri ad vincula was assigned on 20 November 2010, to Donald Wuerl. The previous Cardinal Priest of the Basilica was Pío Laghi, who died on 11 January 2009.

Two Popes were elected in this Church: Pope John II in 533 A.D., and Pope Gregory VII in 1073.

Next to the Church is hosted the Faculty of Engineering of La Sapienza University. This is named "San Pietro in Vincoli" per antonomasia. The Church is located on the Oppian Hill, near Cavour metro station, a short distance from the Colosseum.



File:San Pietro in Vincoli - ceiling, Rome retouched.jpg

Basilica of San Pietro in Vincoli.
18th-Century lacunar ceiling, frescoed in the centre
portraying the Miracle of the Chains (1706).
Photo: 26 December 2009.
Derivative work: Alberto Fernandez Fernandez.
(Wikimedia Commons)


The Interior has a Nave and two Aisles, with three Apses divided by antique Doric Columns. The Aisles are surmounted by Cross-Vaults, while the Nave has an 18th-Century Coffered Ceiling, frescoed in the centre by Giovanni Battista Parodi, portraying the Miracle of the Chains (1706).

Michelangelo's Moses (completed in 1515), while originally intended as part of a massive 47-statue, free-standing funeral monument for Pope Julius II, became the centerpiece of the Pope's funeral monument and tomb in this, the Church of the della Rovere family. Moses is depicted with horns, connotating "the radiance of the Lord", due to the similarity in the Hebrew words for "beams of light" and "horns". This kind of iconographic symbolism was common in early sacred art, and, for an artist, horns are easier to sculpt than rays of light.

Other works of art include two canvasses of Saint Augustine and Saint Margaret by Guercino, the monument of Cardinal Girolamo Agucchi, designed by Domenichino, who is also the painter of a Sacristy fresco depicting the Liberation of Saint Peter (1604). The Altarpiece on the first Chapel to the left is a Deposition by Cristoforo Roncalli. The tomb of Cardinal Nicholas of Kues (died 1464), with its Relief, Cardinal Nicholas before Saint Peter, is by Andrea Bregno. Painter and sculptor Antonio Pollaiuolo is buried at the left side of the entrance. He is the Florentine sculptor who added the figures of Romulus and Remus to the sculpture of the Capitoline Wolf on the Capitol. The tomb of Cardinal Cinzio Passeri Aldobrandini, decorated with imagery of the Grim Reaper, is also in the Church.


File:Moses San Pietro in Vincoli.jpg

Artist: Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564).
Title: Moses.
Date: 1513-1515.
Current location: San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome.
Source/Photographer: Prasenberg (transferred from en.wikipedia to
Commons by User:Leoboudv using CommonsHelper).
(Wikimedia Commons)


In 1876, archaeologists discovered the tombs of those once believed to be the Seven Maccabean Martyrs, depicted in 2 Maccabees 7–41. It is highly unlikely that these are, in fact, the Jewish Martyrs that had offered their lives in Jerusalem. They are remembered each year on 1 August, the same day as the Miracle of the fusing of the Two Chains.

The third Altar, in the left Aisle, holds a mosaic of Saint Sebastian from the 7th-Century. This mosaic is related to an outbreak of plague in Pavia, in Northern Italy. It would only stop if an Altar was built for Saint Sebastian in the Church of S. Pietro in Vincoli in that city. Somehow, this story also became accepted in Rome. Hence the Altar.


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