Saint Peter's tomb in the context of St. Peter's Baldacchino

⭐ Core Definition: Saint Peter's tomb

Saint Peter's tomb is a site under St. Peter's Basilica that includes several graves and a structure said by Vatican authorities to have been built to memorialize the location of Saint Peter's grave. The site of St. Peter's tomb is alleged to be near the west end of the Vatican Necropolis, a complex of mausoleums that date between about AD 130 and AD 300.

The Necropolis complex was partially torn down and filled with earth to provide a foundation for the building of the first St. Peter's Basilica during the reign of Constantine I in about AD 330. As the result of two campaigns of archaeological excavation, many bones have been found at the site of the 2nd-century shrine, but Pope Pius XII stated in December 1950 that none could be confirmed to be Saint Peter's with absolute certainty.

↓ Menu

Saint Peter's tomb in the context of St. Peter's Baldachin

St. Peter's Baldachin (Italian: Baldacchino di San Pietro, L'Altare di Bernini) is a large Baroque sculpted bronze canopy, technically called a ciborium or baldachin, over the high altar of St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, the city-state and papal enclave surrounded by Rome, Italy. The baldachin is at the center of the crossing, and directly under the dome of the basilica. Designed by the Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini, it was intended to mark, in a monumental way, the place of Saint Peter's tomb underneath. Under its canopy is the high altar of the basilica. Commissioned by Pope Urban VIII, the work began in 1623 and ended in 1634. The baldachin acts as a visual focus within the basilica; it is itself a very large structure and forms a visual mediation between the enormous scale of the building and the human scale of the people officiating at the religious ceremonies at the papal altar beneath its canopy.

View the full Wikipedia page for St. Peter's Baldachin

↑ Return to Menu