Interior
The inside has three naves, with pillars joined to the original columns. The altar is built over a bath, which holds the remains of the two martyrs.The apse is frescoed with Christ in Glory (1588) by Cristoforo Roncalli (one of the painters called il Pomarancio) ; while below are three paintings: Martyrdom of Saint John, Martyrdom of Saint Paul, and the Conversion of Terenziano (1726) by Domenico Piastrini, Giacomo Triga, and Pietro Andrea Barbieri respectively. The sacristy features a canvas by Antoniazzo Romano of the Madonna & Child with Saints John the Evangelist & John the Baptist, and Saints Jerome & Paul. Below the nave, thus under the church, some ancient Roman rooms, dating back to the 1st-4th century, were found during 19th century excavations. According to the writer Charlotte Anne Eaton, these rooms were dens that were part of a vivarium in which wild animals were kept before being used in entertainments held at the Colosseum. A low vaulted passage connected this vivarium with the Colosseum.
The Cardinal Priest of the Titulus Ss. Ioannis et Pauli is Edward Egan. Among previous Cardinal Priests of this Title are 2 who became Pope: Pope Honorius III (Cencio Savelli, elevated to cardinal in 1198) and Pope Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli, elevated to cardinal in 1929). Since Francis Spellman became the next Cardinal Priest of the titulus in 1946 (after it had been vacated by Pacelli's election to the papacy in 1939), it has been held by cardinals who were Archbishops of New York. In 2012, Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York was elevated to cardinal and assigned a different title, because Cardinal Edward Egan, the first-ever archbishop emeritus of New York, still had the title of Ss. Giovanni e Paolo.
Read more about this topic: Santi Giovanni E Paolo, Rome
Famous quotes containing the word interior:
“Anyone with a real taste for solitude who indulges that taste encounters the dangers of any other drug-taker. The habit grows. You become an addict.... Absorbed in the visions of solitude, human beings are only interruptions. What voice can equal the voices of solitude? What sights equal the movement of a single day’s tide of light across the floor boards of one room? What drama be as continuously absorbing as the interior one?”
—Jessamyn West (1902–1984)
“The exterior must be joined to the interior to obtain anything from God, that is to say, we must kneel, pray with the lips, and so on, in order that proud man, who would not submit himself to God, may be now subject to the creature.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)
“When the delicious beauty of lineaments loses its power, it is because a more delicious beauty has appeared; that an interior and durable form has been disclosed.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)