In the Marches of Ancona is a sepulchre inscribed to the fratres Comacini, and in the Abruzzi are chapels dedicated by them. In Rome it is recorded that they met in the church of SS. Quattro Coronati. These patron saints of the guild, the four holy crowned ones (Santi Quattro Coronati), strike me as having a peculiar significance in regard to their origin. We are told that during the persecutions under Diocletian, four brethren, named Nicostratus, Claudius, Castorio, and Superian[12] (either brothers, or more likely members of the same Collegium), who were famous for their skill in building and sculpture, refused to exercise their art for the pagan Emperor. "We cannot," they said, "build a temple for false gods, nor shape images in wood or stone to ensnare the souls of others." They were all martyred in different ways: one scourged, one shut up and tortured in an iron case, one thrown into the sea; the other was decapitated. Their relics were in the time of St. Leo placed in four urns, and deposited in the crypt of the church, which was built to their honour, in the time of Honorius, by the Comacines then in Rome. It has always been the especial church of the guild, and their meeting-place. They had an altar dedicated to the same saints at Siena, and another at Venice. We find from the statutes of the Sienese guild as late as the fourteenth century, that the fête of the "Quattro" was kept in a special manner by the Masonic guild. All the Church fêtes are classed together as days when no work is to be done, but the day of the SS. Quattro has two laws all to itself, and is kept with peculiar ceremonies.[13]
On the altar of this church on Mount Aventine are silver busts of the four Magister martyrs; and on the wall is an ancient inscription, as follows—
BEATVS LEO IIII PAPA
PARITER SVB HOC SACRO ALTR̄
REC̄DENS COLLOCAVĪ CORPOR̄ SCŌ
M͞R CLAVDII NICOSTĪ SEMPRON̄I
CAST̄ ET SIMP̄ ET HII FR̄M SEVERI
SEVERIANI CARPOFORI ET VICTO
RINI MARII AVDIFAX EABBACV̄
FELICISSIMO ET AGAPITO YPPOLT̄
OVDE CV̄ SVA FAM̄L NV̄O X ET
VIIII ACQVILINI ET PRISCI ARSEI
AQVNI NARCISI ET MARCELLI
NI FELICIS SIMETRII CANDI
DAE ATO PAVLINÆ ANASTASII
ET FELICIS APOLLIONIS
ET BENEDICTI VENANTII
ATO FELICIS DIOGENIS ET LI
BERALIS FESTI ET MARCELLI
ATO SVPERANTII PVDENTIAN̄E
ET BENEDICTI FELICIS ET BENE
DICTI NECN̄ CAPITA SANCTO
PROTI SC̄EO CECILIA E
SC͞I ALEXANDRI SC̄IO XISTI
ET SC͞I SEBASTIANI ATQ
SACRATISSIME VIRGINIS
PRAXEDIS ET ALIA MVLTA
CORPORA SANCTORVM
QVORVM NOMINA DEO
SVNT COGNITA
If I interpret the abbreviations M͞R. F͞RM and FA͞ML aright, this inscription would imply that members of each of the three grades of the Roman Masonic guild, Magister, Fratres, and Famuli (apprentices), were martyred together, and their remains placed in this church with the relics of some proto-martyrs. The Magistri were afterwards canonized, and the four I have named became the patron saints of the guild. S. Carpophorus was held in special veneration in Como, of which place he was probably a native, or else a Greek member of the Comacine Lodge there.
The other side of the inscription chronicles the restoration of the altar which was ruined and broken down, in the time of Pope Paschalis Secundus, A.D. 1111, in the fourth Indiction.
The church of the SS. Quattro has remains of a fine atrium or portico. In the wall of the atrium is a fragment of intreccio. The original form of the church is well preserved, and is identical with that of S. Agnese, fuori le mura. The gallery for the women is well preserved.
The especial veneration for the four crowned martyrs seems to point to their Roman origin, and to specify the reason why the remnant of the particular Collegium to which they belonged fled from Rome, and took refuge in the safe little republic of Como, so that it was not only the Goths and Vandals from whom they fled. It explains also the intense religion in their work, and rules; the very first principles of which were to respect God's name, and do all to His glory.
It need not excite wonder that any guild should have fled from Rome in these centuries. This was the time that Gregory the Great, painted so graphically in his passionate Homily of Ezechiel, preached at Rome. "Everywhere see we mourning, hear we laments; cities, strongholds, villages are devastated; the earth is a desert. No busy peasants are in the fields, few people in the cities, and these last relics of human kind daily suffer new wounds. There is no end to the scourging of God's judgment.... We see some carried into slavery, others cruelly mutilated, and yet more killed. What joy, oh my brethren, is left to us in life? If it is still dear to us we must look for wounds, and not for pleasures. Behold Rome, once Queen of the world, to what is she reduced?—prostrated by the sorrows and desolation of her citizens, by the fierceness of her enemies and frequent ruin, the prophecy against Samaria has been fulfilled in her. Here no longer have we a senate; the people are perished, save the few who still suffer daily. Rome is empty, and has barely escaped the flames; her buildings are thrown down. The fate of Nineveh is already upon her...."[14]
The Longobard invaders were more merciful than the Goths, for not long after their rule was over, another Pope wrote to Pepin—"Erat sanæ hoc mirabile in regno Longobardorum, nulla erat violenta nulla struebantur insidiæ. Nemo aliquem iniuste angariabat, nemo spoliabat. Non erat furta, non latrocinia, unusquisque quodlibebat securus sine timore pergebat."—Histor. Franc. Scrip. Tom. III. cap. xvi.
Whatever the moving cause, the fact remains that in the Middle Ages the Comacine Masters had a nucleus on that strong little fortified island of Comacina, which, together with Como itself, stood against the Lombards in the sixth century for twenty years before being subjugated; and in the twelfth, held its own independence for a quarter of a century against Milan and the Lombard League, which it refused to join.
When at length the Longobards became their rulers, they respected their art and privileges. The guild remained free as it had been before, and in this freedom its power must have increased fast.
The Masters worked liberally for their new lords, but it was as paid architects, not as serfs. As a proof we may cite an edict signed by King Luitprand on February 28, 713. It is entitled Memoratorio, and is published by Troya in his Codex Diplomaticus Longobardus.
It fixes the prices of every kind of building. Here are the titles of the seven clauses, referring to the payments of the Magistri Comacini: De Mercede Comacinorum—
CLVII. Capit. i. De Sala. "Si sala fecerit, etc."
CLVIII. Capit. ii. De Muro. "Si vero murum fecerit qui usque ad pedem unum sit grossus ... cum axes clauserit et opera gallica fecerit ... si arcum volserit, etc."
Capit. iii. De annonam Comacinorum.
CLIX. Capit. iv. De opera.
CLX. Similiter romanense si fecerit, sic repotet sicut gallica opera.
Capit. v. De Caminata.
CLXI. Capit. vi. De marmorariis.
CLXII. Si quis axes marmoreas fecerit ... et si columnas fecerit de pedes quaternos aut quinos ...
Capit. vii. De furnum.
CLXIII. Capit. viii. De Puteum. Si quis puteum fecerit ad pedes centum.[15]
The