Funerary Monument of Flavius Agricola by Matthew Brennan on Sketchfab

When the necropolis under Mausoleum R in the church of St. Peter in Rome was excavated in 1626, while laying the foundations for Bernini’s baldacchino of they found a sarcophagus with an inscription (EDR147411) expressing a Epicurean view on the world saying something like “friends who read this, listen to my advice, mix wine, tie the garlands around your head and drink deep, and do not deny the pretty girls the sweets of love. When death comes earth and fire consume everything.” – of course this disappointed the expectations of the excavators terribly. Pope Urban VIII ordered that the inscription was plastered and the base destroyed, as well as threatening anyone who would have told about it.

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Room 1 - Inscriptions and history: Previous | Next

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19

Room 0: Introduction

Room 2: Script and Alphabets

Room 3: Objects and the relation between image, text and context

Room 4: Emotions in inscriptions

Room 5: The stone cutter, methods and mistakes

Room 6: Digital technologies for epigraphy

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