Rome: Apostles and Martyrs

4. Porta Latina

Roma, Lazio

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St John's Church at the Porta Latina is the church dedicated to St John the Evangelist, near the spot where the nearly 70-year-old saint survived martyrdom on the 6th of May, 92. The Emperor Domitian ordered that St John be put into a large vat with oil, and slowly boiled to death. But John survived and was not killed. The large, impatient, and expectant crowd eventually turned on the Roman guards, demanding he be removed from the boiling vat. When John was released from the vat, it was discovered that he was completely unharmed by his trial. One observer, Tertullian, said that after emerging from the oil, John was in better health than when he entered the vat. On hearing this, the emperor was angry and decided to exile him instead to the brutal mines on the island of Patmos, which held no hope of survival or rescue for its inhabitants. It was while he was here that St John wrote the Book of Revelations. Many believed that his trial by oil helped him to prepare for his visions. St John reached a venerable age and is said to have lived well into his 90s, eventually dying of natural causes in 99AD, in Ephesus, which is in modern day Turkey. The chapel of San Giovanni in Oleo was built on the exact spot where the pleas of the people are said to have saved St John, and festivities were heldeach year at the Porta Latina to celebrate the miracle of John's survival. This was observed until 1962 when Pope Pius XII discontinued saints'second feasts. Photo credit: Peter Bartley (gate)