The Salarian Way is exceedingly rich in Christian cemeteries. Prominent among these is the Catacomb of St. Priscilla, one of the noblest monuments of the primitive church. It is of interest also as that whose accidental discovery in 1578 led to the unveiling of these vast treasuries of Christian antiquity. The entrance is beautifully situated amid embowering verdure, in the vineyard of the Irish college, about two miles from the Porta Salara.[321] Tradition asserts that this cemetery was dug in the property of the senator Pudens, mentioned by St. Paul; and a crypt called, from the language of its inscriptions, the _Cappella Greca_, is alleged to be the sepulchre of his daughters Pudentiana and Praxedes, and other members of that distinguished Christian family. If so, this is the most ancient Catacomb yet discovered. The classical style of the architecture, frescoes, graceful stucco reliefs, and garlands, and the character of the inscriptions, all point to a period before art became degraded and the church oppressed. Some of the galleries are exceedingly long and straight, and one is the most extensive yet discovered. Its principal crypt is remarkable as being regularly built of masonry, and without the usual _loculi_ in the walls, being evidently designed for the reception of sarcophagi--another proof of its high antiquity. A portion of this cemetery has been constructed with great labour in an ancient _arenarium_, and shows how unsuited these excavations were for 199 the purposes of Christian sepulture. Long walls of solid masonry and numerous pillars of brick work have been built for supporting the roof and giving space for _loculi_. A large shaft for removing _pozzolana_ has been transformed into a _luminare_ by being bricked up to about half its original dimensions. Only one of the four _piani_ in which the Catacomb is constructed being easily accessible, it has been but partially explored. The ancient records assert that Marcellinus and Marcellus, martyr-bishops of the church in the time of Diocletian, are buried here; also Crescentianus and Silvester; and we have already seen the memorial inscription of three thousand other martyrs, whose remains are said to hallow these sacred crypts. On this same road are the Catacomb of St. Felicitas, with three _piani_ of galleries much dilapidated; that of Thraso and Saturninus, of considerable extent but difficult of access; and the crypt of Chrysanthus and Daria, in which these martyrs were blocked up alive by command of the Emperor Numerian. On the old Salarian Way is the Catacomb of Hermes, who is said to have suffered in the time of Hadrian. It is partially constructed, as we have seen, in an _arenarium_, and contains the largest subterranean church yet found, with remarkable mosaics of Daniel and of the resurrection of Lazarus in the vaulting of the roof.