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..... a trip to the catacombs of the Capuchin

(Click on any picture to enlarge it.)

We are in Campofelice di Roccella, a town of 6000 souls on the north coast of Sicily, it is 9^th October 2009, a sunny day with the thermometer already showing 25° C, a light, pleasant, breeze blows over our hotel terrace as we sit at breakfast. Over a cup of macchiato, we (Peter, Hanni & Heide) discuss our plans for the day. It is our third day on Sicily and today we plan to drive  in our hired car the almost 60 Km to the capital,  Palermo. A brave undertaking, as Palermo traffic is a continual mix of  chaos and confusion. Traffic laws as we know them here in Germany just don't exist, and don't forget to lock the car from inside during the journey as the chances of being robbed  during the “Stop and Go” of the over 700,000 inhabitants of the capital are very high.

We have already spoken of all this as we drive along the A19, the oldest motorway in Sicily. Our destination today though is not to view the beauty of the town, like the Cathedral of Palermo, but the Capuchin catacombs, the world famous burial chambers.

The A19 to Palermo

Piazza Cappuccini

The traffic is easy and we have a good journey on the motorway. Then my Sat Nav says that I should turn off and head into the middle of Palermo. I had programmed the address of the catacombs into my Sat Nav back home in Germany when planning the trip. What I didn't know was that the address (Via Cappuccini 1) that I'd got from the internet, was not quite correct, in fact it was quite wrong,  and so began an almost 2 hour journey experincing the delights of driving in Palermo as the correct address is Piazza Cappuccini, which is 1,6Km from Via Cappuccini. That may not seem much, but in  Palermo it can be, while in all the traffic chaos there is little chance to find your destination let alone a decent car park within easy walking distance. It was only after entering “points of interest” into the Sat Nav that we eventually arrived at the catacombs.

For anyone who would also like to visit the catacombs the correct address and coordinates are:

Convento dei Cappuccini  

Piazza Cappuccini

90129 Palermo

Tel: 091 / 212633

Italy

38° 06' 714”North, 13° 20' 355” East

Our Hire Car on the Piazza Cappuccini

Convento dei Cappuccini, Palermo Sicily

Entrance to the catacombs of Palermo

Left in the picture the Priests Entrance, Right the Mens

13:00hr and we eventually stand at the entrance to the catacombs, hey it's true Murphy's Law does work, even in Palermo, the doors are closed, dinner break (Siesta) till 15:00hr. So with patients, we wait, as we had a parking place directly in front of the catacombs and so with the engine running (air conditioner) and a warm famous soft drink (shared between the three of us) on the car park in front of the Capuchin cloister. At about 14:55h there appeared a dubious man of about 40-45 years who explained at about 110 decibels, that for 1 Euro he would keep an eye on our car. […..] He called it security, I called it protection money.

Childrens Niche

Girl in Coffin

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Monk

Priests corridor

Womans corridor

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a woman

Mummy of a Monk

Our rental car was fully insured, however, I didn't like the idea of returning to it after our visit to the catacombs to find the tires flat, if still there, or scratches all over the paint work, broken windows and other little niceties that this self appointed security man would prevent. So I gave him a Euro and made him give me his word that he would take extra care of the car.

Punctually at 15:00h the doors were opened.

What is it in the catacombs that is so interesting that one takes these small things without a second thought.

Quote from Wikipedia (Germany)

The Capuchin grotto of Palermo (Ital: Le Catacombe dei Cappuccini), a large burial chamber under the Capuchin cloister is, with its natural mummies one of the most famous burial sites of the world.

In the year 1534, the Capuchin, a newly formed branch of the Franciscan order, built their first cloister  on Sicilian soil,in front of the gates of Palermo. In 1599 it was decided to build a new burial chamber underneath the High alter, asthe space for the increasing number of dead monks was becoming too small. As the brothers climbed down  in order the bring the 40 bodies from the old chamber to the new one they discovered to their amazement that they did not have skeletons as they were expecting but dried mummies.  The Abbot decided that the mummies should be placed along the walls in order to remind the monks to think about and prepare for their own ultimate deaths.

The oldest still preserved body is that of Frate Silvestro da Gubbio, who died in 1599. In the area of the Priests corridor is the body of Mons. Franco D'Agostino, a Bishop (byzantine Ritual) in full robes.

Priests mummy

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Monk

Skellital remains in the Convento dei Cappuccini

Dried mummy

Mummy of a Palermitan

Priests mummy

One of the mummies damaged by fire

Until 1670 the Capuchin grotto was used by the monks as a burial chamber. Over time however the pressure on the cloister from outside believers to be buried in the chamber became greater. Especially high up members of Palermo wanted to be buried close to the holy order.  This could not be resisted by the brothers especially from supporters of the cloister. Up to 1739 permission to be buried in the chamber was allowed only to the general chapter and superiors of the Capuchin and then the members of the cloister.  To overcome the growing pressure the brothers developed a special method. This involved, first that the freshly delivered bodies were placed in small dry rooms so called “Colatoi” on terracotta stands over stone troughs.

The drying chambers were as with the rest of the grotto, cut into the volcanic rock, or in some cases lined with the rock. The drying took place here, and as apposed to other finds of this sort, under complete airtightness. The pouros stone sucked the body fluids out, and could take from between eight and ten months for it to be completely dry. It was then washed with vinegar, was laid to dry for two weeks in the sun and finally clothed in its ceremonial robes, uniform or best clothes. Only then would its place in one of the corridors be known to friends and family for them visit and from time to time re-dress the mummy in fresh clothes.

As well as the described natural mummification there was also the method of using caulk or caulk milk as well as arsenic. Mummies that were prepared the last way are especially well preserved.

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Palermitan

Mummy of a Palermitan

In the corridor of professionals  

A Palermitan couple

died 11^th May 1851

Professionals – Doctors, Teachers etc,

Childs mummy

Mummy of a girl (Childrens Niche)

The wants of the upper circles of Palermo to be buried by the Capuchin continued undisturbed for more than two hundred years. Only in 1837 did the government forbid this form of burial. However there continued to be burials up to 1881, although the mummified body had to be placed in a coffin. Since then, the grotto with its 1200 mummies (travel brochures and other publications write of the several thousand over the complete history) has remained unchanged.

Many of the mummies are damaged or have not survived the passage of time, but there are still many hundreds of undamaged mummies to be seen. In total there are five corridors or passages, The Men`s passage, The Women`s passage, The passage of Professionals,( doctors, lawyers, teachers, artists politicians as well as officers of the courts and Italian military), The Priests passage and the Monks/Brothers passage, two niches, The Virgins niche and the Children's niche, a Chapel of the holy Rosalia and other rooms. One of which is one of the opened “Cataloi”,  in it can be found, even today, two dried bodies, which have not  been buried  before.

Many of the coffins in the Women´s passage were damaged or destroyed when Palermo was the target of a bomber attack on 11^th March 1943 and the grotto was hit.

In a fire in 1966, again in this area many more were damaged or destroyed.

Rosalia Lombardo 1918-1920

Concettina Marino 1875-1880

With the bodies in the chapel of the H. Rosalia is the perfectly preserved body of the two year old Rosalia Lombardo, who died on 6^th December 1920 of the Spanish Flu. In 2009 the secret of the mummification was revealed, after the notes of  Alfredo Salafia, who was charged with the embalming, were found. He used a mixture of glycerin, formalin, zinc-sulfate and other chemicals.

Alfredo Salafia -  born 7^th November 1869, died 31^st January 1933  Italian specialist of embalming. He embalmed amongst others, the body of the Italian Prime-minister Francesco Crispi 1902 and the Archbishop of Palermo Pietro Michelangelo Celesa 1904. Today Salafia is remembered for the embalming of Rosalia Lombardo. Salafia died of a stroke and is buried in the cemetery of Santa Maria di Gesu, Palermo / Sicily  (Photo: N24)

Childs mummy in the cradle

Mummy of a lawyer

Childs mummy in the cradle

Skeleton in a rock niche

Mummy of a member of the upper class

At the till we had to pay 3Euro per person and to my astonishment there was not another “guest” to be found that wanted to see the mummies, oh well, not everyone takes pleasure in looking at the dead. We entered the hall and followed the white plastered walls down, then a couple of steps and in a second it was as if I had been transported with the speed of light to Indiana Jones' temple of Doom or into a mega brutal Spaghetti western a la Sergio Leone. What there is here to see is definitely not for the feint of heart, wherever you look.. Bodies! They stand (tied with wire) in the passages. They sit, they kneel. Some fully rotted, others more or less completely preserved.

Really hard was the passage where the children are, from babies to school children, they are all here, some of the babies lie in their cradles and look so thirsty. After about 30mins Hanni and Heide left the catacombs, it was as if their air had been shut off. I stayed alone for a further 30 min. then I too left.

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Palermitan

Priests mummy

Alberto Da Palterz † .9.19.1847

Mummy of a Monk

Priests mummy

Mummy of a small girl

Mummy of a woman

A red dress for the ages

This couple is still together in death

On  April 14^th 2010 the ZDF (A Germany television channel) in their series Arbenteuer Wissen (Adventure in Knowledge) broadcast an excellent episode with the title “Rosalia's Geheimnis” (Rosalia's Secret). Reporter Karsten Schwanke and the ZDF team followed an Anthropological-team and the expert Prof. Albert Zink and Dr. Dario Piomino-Mascalli from the European Academy Bozen(EURAC) and went with them on a journey in time, to uncover the puzzle of the embalment of Rosalia Lombardo and the preserve her mummy for the future.

Rosalia Lombardo 1918 - 1920 "The most beautiful and best preserved mummy in the world"

(Photo: ZDF / Anne Hartmann)

Giovanni Paterniti († May 1, 1911)

Giuseppe Siciliano († March 20, 1851)

Antonio Prestigiacomo ( † 1844 )

Colonel Giuliano (died 1818)

Colonel Paolo Racona (died. 1862)

Mummy of a Palermitan

Mummy damaged in WW II

Mummy of a Monk

Professional

Mummy of a woman

Mummy of a Palermitan

Mummy of a Monk

Mummy of a Palermitan

Mummy without head 

(perhaps a Highlander)

Woman in a coffin

Deep in the catacombs ...

More images of the mummies can be found in our photo gallery

Mummy of a Palermitan

View in a coffin

Mummy of a Palermitan

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