Christian antiquities -- Italy -- Rome; Rome (Italy) -- Antiquities
The church was entered by five doors, named respectively (from left to
right) the Porta _Iudicii_, _Ravenniana_, _argentea_ or _regia maior_,
_Romana_, and _Guidonea_. The first was called the "Judgment Door,"
because funerals entered or passed out through it. The name
"Ravenniana" seems to have originated in the barracks of marine
infantry of the fleet of Ravenna, detailed for duty in Rome, or else
from the name "Civitas Ravenniana" given to the Trastevere in the
epoch of the decadence. It was reserved for the use of men, as the
fourth or Romana was for women, and the fifth, Guidonea, for tourists
and pilgrims. The main entrance, called the "Royal," or "Silver Door,"
was opened only on grand occasions. Its name was derived from the
silver ornaments affixed to the bronze by Honorius I. (A. D. 626-636)
in commemoration of the reunion of the church of Histria with the See
of Rome. According to the "Liber Pontificalis" nine hundred and
seventy-five pounds of silver were used in the work. There were the
figures of S. Peter on the left and S. Paul on the right, surrounded
by halos of precious stones. They were the prey of the Saracens in
845. Leo IV. restored them to a certain extent, changing the subject
of the silver _nielli_. In the year 1437, Antonio di Michele da
Viterbo, a Dominican lay brother, was commissioned by Pope Eugenius
IV. to carve new side doors in wood, while Antonio Filarete and Simone
Bardi were asked to model and cast, in bronze, those of the middle
entrance.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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