578th ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING, 



HELD IN COMMITTEE ROOM B, THE CENTRAL HALL, 

 WESTMINSTER, ON MONDAY, M ARCH 20 th, 1916, 

 at 4.30 P.M. 



E. J. Sew ell, Esq., in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the preceding Meeting were read and confirmed. 



The Secretary announced the election of the Rev. J. W. Hayes, 

 Miss M. K. Purcell, and Mrs. Katherine Tod as Associates of the 

 Institute. 



The Chairman invited the Rev. Prebendary H. E. Fox, M.A., to 

 deliver his lecture descriptive of " Inscriptions and Drawings from 

 Roman Catacombs." 



The lecture was illustrated throughout by lantern slides. 



INSCRIPTIONS AND DRAWINGS FROM ROMAN 

 CATACOMBS. By the Rev. Prebendary H. E. Fox, M.A. 



THE value of the Inscriptions in the Catacombs, especially those 

 around and near Rome, has long; been recognized as illus- 

 trating the religious and social life of Early Christianity. 

 Though a large number were probably destroyed before the 

 discovery of these burying places in the sixteenth century, 

 sufficient remain and are preserved in various galleries to 

 enable students to gain a good general idea of the conditions of 

 the first four or five centuries. So many visitors to Rome 

 have at least looked into the old burial places that it is hardly 

 necessary to describe the branching galleries with their chapels, 

 sometimes in two or three stories below ground, where, cut in 

 the soft rock and closed with large earthenware tablets, were 

 the resting places of countless bodies. 



For the Christians followed the example of the Jews in 

 burying their dead. The pagans disposed of theirs by cremation, 

 placing the ashes in urns which were deposited in chambers 

 just below the level of the soil, known as columbaria from the 

 resemblance of the rows of niches to pigeon holes. Two of 

 these ancient places close to one another are still in excellent 

 condition. They are on the Appian Way and are believed, on 

 authorities given by Bishop Lightfoot, to have belonged to the 



