Saint Peter's tomb is a site under St. Peter's
Basilica that includes several graves and a structure said by Vatican
authorities to have been built to memorialize the location of St. Peter's
grave. St. Peter's tomb is near the west end of a complex of mausoleums that
date between about AD 130 and AD 300. The complex was partially torn down and
filled with earth to provide a foundation for the building of the first St.
Peter's Basilica during the reign of Constantine I in about AD 330. Though many
bones have been found at the site of the 2nd-century shrine, as the result of
two campaigns of archaeological excavation, Pope Pius XII stated in December
1950 that none could be confirmed to be Saint Peter's with absolute certainty. However,
following the discovery of further bones and an inscription, on June 26, 1968
Pope Paul VI announced that the relics of St. Peter had been identified. The
grave claimed by the Church to be that of St. Peter lies at the foot of the
aedicula beneath the floor. The remains of four individuals and several farm
animals were found in this grave. In 1953, after the initial archeological
efforts had been completed, another set of bones were found that were said to
have been removed without the archeologists' knowledge from a niche (loculus)
in the north side of a wall (the graffiti wall) that abuts the red wall on the
right of the aedicula. Subsequent testing indicated that these were the bones of
a 60-70-year-old man. Margherita Guarducci argued that these were the remains
of St. Peter and that they had been moved into a niche in the graffiti wall
from the grave under the aedicula "at the time of Constantine, after the
peace of the church" (313) •
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