Chiesa di Santa Passera

The Church of Santa Passera is a Roman church dating from the early 5th century, renovated and extended in the 14th century, built on the remains of a Roman mausoleum and crypt dating from the second half of the 2nd century.

The origin of the name of the church, located in Rome's Portuense district, is uncertain since there has never been a saint named Passera.

According to tradition, it was built on the banks of the Tiber at the place where, at the beginning of the 5th century, the remains of two Alexandrian saints, Cyrus and John, were landed from Egypt to be transferred to the city of Rome. From the 11th century onwards it belonged to the monastery of Santa Maria in Via Lata, and in 11th-13th century documents it is called Sancti Abbacyri or Sancti Cyri et Iohannis, in memory of the two saints for whom the church was built. In the 14th century, the name Abbaciro was replaced by that of Santa Pacera or Passera: thus in a document of 1317, a plot of land posita extra portam Portuensem in loco qui dicitur S. Pacera is mentioned. This appellation was to prevail in later centuries.

Regarding the origin of the name Passera, a saint who never existed in the history of Christianity, the hypothesis is that it derives from the title Abbàs Cyrus (Father Cyrus), hence the name Abbaciro: from the popular mispronunciation of this term would be derived Appaciro, Appàcero, Pàcero, Pàcera and finally Passera.

Further confusing the church's onomastics was also the popular error that arbitrarily equated the fictitious Saint Passera with Saint Praxedes and celebrated her feast day there on 21 July[3] to coincide with the celebrations of the latter martyr.

Nel XIV secolo l'antica chiesa fu completamente ristrutturata e sopraelevata.

The Santa Passera complex consists of three superimposed floors.

The church
The 14th-century upper church has a rectangular plan with a single nave, apse and wooden ceiling, built on a pre-existing building, a Roman mausoleum, the architectural features of which can still be seen externally on the left side of the church; the building has features very similar to the cenotaph of Annia Regilla, the latter dating back to the second half of the 2nd century AD.[2] The façade of the church is in an elevated position, preceded by a terrace accessed by a double flight of stairs. Inside, a semicircular presbytery holds the image of Christ in the company of a host of saints. Another painting also depicts Christ with Saints Cyrus and John.

The Oratory
On the lower floor are the underground remains of the 5th-century medieval oratory, accessed through an external door below ground level. The oratory consists of four brick-built and intercommunicating rooms. The door bears an inscription testifying to the ancient use of the structure as the tomb of Saints Cyrus and John:

(LA)
CORPORA SANCTI CYRI RENITENT HIC ATQVEE IOANNIS
QVOÆ QUONDAM ROMÆ DEDIT ALEXANDRIA MAGNA.

( ENGL)
Here shine the holy bodies of Cyrus and John
that the great Alexandria once gave to Rome.

(Inscription at the entrance door of the crypt)

The crypt
From the oratory, a small staircase leads down into the narrow underground crypt with a rectangular floor plan, which originally held the remains of the two martyred saints. The room, buried after 1706, was rediscovered in 1904 and can be dated to between the end of the 2nd century and the beginning of the 3rd century. Little light comes from an opening in the vault and the stairs. Traces of pictorial decorations can be seen on the walls, some of which have been damaged by the countless floods of the nearby Tiber, and some of which have been vandalised. Traces of funerary decorations can still be seen: on the vault some glyphs and stars. On the north wall, the goddess Dike, holding scales, was represented, followed by a bird and a boxer. On the south wall, a sheep and a few strokes in red pigment can be glimpsed. Towards the end of the 13th century, a Madonna and Child was painted, which was removed and stolen in 1968.

In mass culture
The correspondence of the hypothetical saint's name with that of the female sex organ, as known in the Roman dialect and mentioned by the poet Giuseppe Gioachino Belli, has often given rise to popular double entendres and puns.
The church served as the backdrop for some scenes in Pier Paolo Pasolini's film Uccellacci e uccellini.