The Basilica dei Santi Cosma e Damiano in Via Sacra
	The Basilica is located in the heart of the historical center of Rome, among the most famous monuments of the ancient Roman world, including the Coliseum, the Basilica of Maxentius, the Forums, Trajan's Column, and the Trajan Markets. Around 530 Pope Felix IV dedicated the Basilica to the physician twins Saints Cosma and Damiano, who were originally from Asia Minor, and martyred under Diocletian in 303 A.D. The Basilica was founded in an area which had been frequented by famous physicians. The "Bibliotheca Pacis" is from the Flavian era (73 A.D.) and a circular temple (309 A.D.) given by Amalasunta, the daughter of Theodoric, were joined and transformed into a Christian church with the construction of the apse and its mosaics, some other spaces, and the entrance from the Via Sacra in the Forum. Along with St. Maria Antiqua, the church was the first place of Christian worship in the Forum, and since it did not have a parochial function, it became a real and proper sanctuary for the faithful to invoke the healing of the Saints Cosma and Damiano. St. Gregory the Great (590-604 AD) placed the relics of the saints and of their brothers under the altar in the Basilica.
In the Eleventh century, a Romanic-style bell tower was built near the current entrance, but was destroyed by an earthquake in 1600 [it is visible in the above etching, which was done prior to this date]. In the Sixteenth Century the nave of the Basilica was narrowed in order to make room for the chapels which were to host the relics of saints and martyrs from the early Christian era. In the course of the centuries, the unsanitary conditions of the area surrounding the Forums, which were reduced to malaria-inducing swamps, caused the decay of the Basilica, which in 1512 was given to the Franciscans of the TOR (Third Regular Order). Pope Urban VIII promoted the transformation of the ancient building (between 1626 and 1638), which culminated in the construction of the Higher Basilica, approximately 21 feet above the original building, the adjacent Cloister, and a Convent for the members of the Order. In 1947 the current entrance from the Via dei Fori Imperiali was built. The mosaic above the altar was created with the Lower Basilica around 530 A.D. by artists of the Roman school, in the late Roman Imperial style; in the center, Christ the Redeemer rises into the heavens, to the left the apostle Paul, and to the right, the apostle Peter present Damiano and Cosma the crown of their martyrdom. To the sides, Pope Felix IV brings a model of the Basilica as a gift and St. Theodore the Soldier is dressed as a Byzantine dignitary of the court of Justinian. Below this, a procession of sheep, the symbols of Christianity, are on the road to Jerusalem and Bethlehem towards the Lamb of Gob, from which the rivers of life flow. Completing the scene is the Basilica's dedication to the Holy Saints and Martyrs. During a renovation in the Seventeenth century, the original width of the mosaic was reduced, and a few figures in the subarch and on the front arch itself were cut off. The mosaic on the front arch, which some believe was created under Sergio I (687-701) completes the main theme of the apse, and represents the First Vision of the Apocalypse. In the center, the Lamb of God has the scroll of the Law at its feet, sealed with seven seals, and on the sides are seven candelabra symbolizing the seven churches, four angels on clouds of fire, the symbols of the evangelists Luke and John (the symbols of Mark and Matthew were covered by the side chapels). The Altar, in the Baroque style, dates to 1638, and reutilizes the columns of the altar of the Lower Basilica around the image of the Madonna of Health, which is a Thirteenth century re-working of an older image taken from the Lower Basilica. The Crowns of the Madonna and Child were stolen in 1988. Around the nave there are seven side chapels, in the Baroque style. The most notable, in the Chapel of the Crucifix, contains a fresco from the Lower Basilica, which represents the crucified Jesus dressed as a Byzantine emperor.
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