n the sixteenth
century, and in the second are two columns of pavonazzetto marble.

Something better is to be had in the utterly desolate baptistery close
by known as S. Maria in Cosmedin. This was originally, as we may
think, the ancient bath of which Agnellus speaks, and it was converted
into a baptistery by the Arians, and later consecrated for Catholic
uses under the title of S. Maria in Cosmedin and used as an oratory.
It is an octagonal building whose walls support a cupola which is
covered with mosaics in circles like that of the original baptistery
of the city. In the midst we see Christ almost a youth standing naked
in Jordan immersed to his waist. Upon His left, S. John stands upon a
rock, his staff in his left hand, while his right rests upon the head
of Our Lord. Opposite to him sits enthroned the old god of Jordan, a
reed in his hand, listening, perhaps, to the words of the Father:
"This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." Over Christ's head
the Dove is displayed in the golden heaven.

About the central mosaic is set a band of palm leaves, while on the
outer circle we see the twelve Apostles very much like the martyrs of
S. Apollinare standing dressed in white, their crowns in their hands
between palms. Only S. Peter and another, perhaps S. John or S. Paul,
do not bear crowns, but S. Peter his keys and the other a book.
Between them is set a throne on which stands a jewelled cross.

It is exceedingly difficult to say when these mosaics were executed,
for they have been so entirely restored that very little of the
original work is left to us. They are certainly very early for work of
the Catholic restoration; and yet they remind one strongly of the
processions of S. Apollinare Nuovo. If as a whole the design of these
mosaics is of the time of the archbishop S. Agnellus, it is curious
that the subject of the Baptism should have been used for a church
which by his act had ceased to be a baptistery. The most reasonable
hypothesis would seem to be that the design and choice of subject is
in the main due to the Arians; that the central disc remains late work
of their time in so far as it is original at all. While the apostles
may be in the main the work of the Catholic restoration.

Theodoric was, as these works serve to show, a great builder of
churches in his capital. Not all of them have remained to our day. Dr.
Ricci has thought that we see something of one of them in the Portico
Antico of the P