Relics
According to an early hagiography, his relics were transferred by order of Saint Severus, Bishop of Naples, to the Neapolitan catacombs "extra moenia," "outside the walls". In the early tenth century the body was moved to Beneventum by Sico, prince of Benevento, with the head remaining in Naples. Subsequently, during the turmoil at the time of Frederick Barbarossa, his body was moved again, this time to the Territorial Abbey of Montevergine where it was rediscovered in 1480.
At the instigation of Cardinal Oliviero Carafa, his body was finally transferred in 1497 to Naples, where he is the city's patron saint. Carafa commissioned a richly decorated crypt, the Succorpo, beneath the cathedral to house the reunited body and head properly. The "Succorpo" was finished in 1506 and is considered one of the prominent monuments of the High Renaissance in the city.
Read more about this topic: Januarius
Famous quotes containing the word relics:
“What’s to do?
Shall we go see the relics of this town?”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Oh! breathe not his name, let it sleep in the shade,
Where cold and unhonour’d his relics are laid.”
—Thomas Moore (1779–1852)
“Is it not singular that, while the religious world is gradually picking to pieces its old testaments, here are some coming slowly after, on the seashore, picking up the durable relics of perhaps older books, and putting them together again?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)