Restoring the Luster to the Basilica Aurea

by Elizabeth Lev, appearing in Volume 46

After a long period of decline, the cathedral originally dedicated to Christ the Savior and, centuries later, rededicated in honor of Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist (the archbasilica’s Latin name is Archibasilica Sanctissimi Salvatoris ac Sancti Ioannis Baptistae et Ioannis Evangelistae ad Lateranum) saw a resurgence in the Middle Ages. The Constantinian church, once known as the Basilica Aurea or the “golden basilica” for its gilt furnishings and its fabulous fastigium, a massive altarpiece in silver and gold, had been plundered by looting and devasted by fire and earthquakes. By the end of the ninth century, the church that had dazzled Charlemagne in 800 had lost its luster.

In an ironic twist of fate, the renovation of the church began with Pope Sergius III (904-911), one of the most worldly and unworthy of the successors of Saint Peter. Sergius was whispered to have murdered two of his predecessors, fathered a child who later became pope, and participated in the “cadaver synod” which involved the exhumation of Pope Formosus’ corpse to put it on trial. For its part, the advanced degradation of the edifice, like the Picture of Dorian Gray, mirrored the horrific degradation of the papacy, making a mockery of the basilica’s claim to be “mother and head of all the churches in the city and in the world.”

Though probably motivated by self-preservation, Sergius’ decision to rebuild the basilica and construct formidable walls around the complex saved the church. Sergius’ citadel was known as the “Patriarchum,” and within those walls, partially rediscovered this year during works for the upcoming Jubilee Year of 2025, the corruption of the papacy festered until the death of Pope Benedict IX in 1045. Then the walls of the Lateran saw a new flowering of reform.

A series of ecumenical councils from 1123 to 1215 hosted at the Lateran addressed the ugliness of clerical corruption, the desecration of sacraments, and the need to assert independence from ever-encroaching secular leaders. These attempts at purification of the universal Church were accompanied notably by a beautification of the pope’s church.

In 1209, an encounter took place on the troubled soil of the Lateran that would herald the renaissance of the basilica. Saint Francis of Assisi arrived in Rome with eleven of his followers to seek approval for his rule from Pope Innocent III. While at first hesitant, Innocent then dreamt of a mendicant who would rebuild the Church. Emboldened by this vision, the pope approved the rule of the Friars Minor and shortly thereafter the Order of Preachers. A new wind was sweeping through the Church.

The Patriarchum was embellished with a new stunning cloister assembled from 1215 to 1234 by the Vassaletto family. Inspired by the new architectural developments among the Cistercians in Burgundy, this enclosed gathering space for the canons of the cathedral afforded greater order to their spiritual life. The innovation of the Vassaletti in the Lateran eschewed the typical recycled ancient material in favor of crafting each column, capital, and relief individually. This variety reflected the renewed sense of universality in the Church after the era of the crusades with the renewal of pilgrimages and a growing excitement about relics. No longer was the Lateran a fiefdom in the turf wars of local nobles, but the nerve center of a universal Church.

The Francis effect was soon apparent in the basilica’s décor. Between 1287 and 1292, the apse, once adorned with the mosaic visage of Christ gazing out from a blue background, was embellished with an array of saints venerating the jeweled cross. Against a glittering golden background, Mary, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul, Andrew, and John the Evangelist shine in ruby, emerald, sapphire and topaz hues. But interposed among them, two smaller figures garbed in plain brown robes, Saint Francis and Saint Anthony, add a touch of syncopation to the stately rhythm. Contemporary witnesses to Christ, they are represented in smaller scale as “junior” saints, but at the same time they express the continual growth and renewal of the Church. The inclusion of these Franciscans is not surprising given that the artists, Jacopo of Camerino and Jacopo Torriti, were both Friars Minor, as was Pope Nicholas IV who commissioned them and is portrayed in the apse kneeling next to the Virgin.

During this time, the ongoing crusades not only allowed pilgrims to visit the Holy Land, but also spurred a renewed interest in relics, so much so that the Fourth Lateran Council intervened on the question of the sale and authenticity of these sacred objects. Saint John Lateran came into its own in this era, as it could boast the greatest set of relics in Christendom. For centuries, popes had amassed an array of relics so significant it was inscribed in mosaic, the Tabula Lateranensis Magna, which recorded the relics held by the basilica in the twelfth century and is now kept in the corridor leading to the sacristy. From fog from the ninth plague of Egypt to Jesus’ foreskin, these marvels were an attraction to pilgrims from all over the world. The most precious of all the relics was the table of the Last Supper, now displayed in the transept but kept at the time in the Pope’s private chapel.

All the new adornment prepared the cathedral for its next great chapter in Roman history: the first Jubilee Year declared by Boniface VIII in 1300. The Lateran’s location between the basilicas of Saint Peter and Saint Paul made it the culmination of the pilgrims’ devotional visits. To beautify the basilica for this event, Boniface hired the celebrated painter Giotto for a cycle of frescoes depicting scenes of the history of the Lateran, the world’s oldest legally built church, and the Jubilee Year. Despite the great success of the Holy Year, with an estimated 200,000 pilgrims, including Dante Alighieri, journeying to the Eternal City, eight years later, the papacy deserted Rome for Avignon, abandoning the city and its Basilica Aurea to warring local factions. Giotto’s paintings were destroyed by fire in 1360, with one sole surviving fragment—the image of Pope Boniface VIII at the Loggia of Benedictions declaring the first Jubilee in history, the ecclesiastical equivalent of the photo of man’s first step on the moon.

When Blessed Pope Urban V returned from France in 1367, he found that both the stability of the basilica and the faith of his see had declined drastically during the papal absence. He set about rectifying both, with the help of the deep pockets of the King of France, by building Rome’s last, great Gothic ciborium.

The Fourth Lateran Council had authorized the term “transubstantiation” to describe the process by which the bread and wine of the Mass become the body and blood of Christ. While it was a boon to have a word to describe the mystery, there was a need for a liturgical decoration that could visually highlight this teaching to the faithful. The ciborium, a canopy erected above the altar, became immensely popular during the thirteenth century, with exemplars found in Saint Paul’s Outside the Walls and Saint Cecilia. Named for its similarity to the Eucharistic chalice, ciboria were carved, gilded, and inlaid to focus the attention of the congregation on the site of Christ’s presence on the altar.

Urban hired architect Giovanni di Stefano in 1368 to construct the largest ciborium ever designed, a towering two-story monument that would dominate the vast nave of the church.

Intended to recall the majesty of the ancient fastigium erected by Constantine in the same place, the ciborium was of a unique design, most likely due to its dual purpose. Not only would it single out the altar of the bishop of Rome, but the upper part would also contain prized relics, in particular the skulls of Saint Peter and Saint Paul enclosed within newly commissioned golden reliquaries. Scenes of saints and the story of salvation, frescoed originally by Barna da Siena but today heavily restored, decorated the juncture between the reliquary and the altar.

The altar itself was entrusted with another precious relic: the table used by Saint Peter during his tenure as bishop of Rome. The light-weight wooden mensa recalled the ancient Christian community on the run, hunted by authorities. Enclosing that table in stone spoke to the stability granted to the Christian faith by Constantine’s decree of tolerance, and perhaps suggested the pope’s hope to anchor the papacy back in its original see.

Urban V was perhaps premature in his thinking, since the papacy would not re-establish itself definitively in Rome until Pope Martin V Colonna in 1417. A scion of an ancient Roman family, Martin V rebuilt the church and added the stunning Cosmatesque floor to the basilica, where his family symbol of the column can still be seen today. Upon his death in 1434, he was buried in the basilica with sixteen of his medieval predecessors, concluding the turbulent yet prestigious era of the Basilica Aurea. Future popes would make their home in the Vatican, deflecting the attention from the cathedral to the burial site of Saint Peter.

The patchwork of artistic styles in Saint John Lateran reflects the many ups and downs of the papacy itself and offers a promise of hope. Though the Church may suffer and stumble, it always rights itself and produces something new, good, and beautiful.