The inscription reads: "Here lies Tiberius Natronius Venustus. He lived four years, four months, and ten days."
From the Roman Necropolis of the Via Triumphalis - also known as the Necropolis of Santa Rosa - beneath Vatican City.
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Roman law forbade the cremation and burial of the dead within the city for safety and hygiene reasons, and so cemeteries were located along the roads outside the urban area. This particular “city of the dead” was constructed on a sloping hillside alongside the Via Triumphalis which was a major thoroughfare that led into and out of the imperial city. The burial ground was in use between the first century B.C.E and the fourth century C.E. A series of mudslides in the area later served to preserve a number of the tombs and their decorations, which included frescoes, mosaics, and sculpted marble sarcophagi. In many cases inscribed funerary stelae have been found, noting the identity of the deceased and giving something of their personal histories; the memorialized were most often members of the middle and lower ranks of imperial Roman society. First discovered in the 1940s, archaeological work only began six decades later.
The underground site covers nearly eleven thousand square feet, with the tombs distributed along the slopes on a number of terraces. Thus far, approximately two-hundred and fifty graves contained within more than forty tombs have been discovered. Previously only accessible to scholars and specialists, last year the Vatican opened up the site to the public.
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