Note 359 — Chapter II

Sometimes this superzealous interpretation leads to absurd mistakes. Aringhi devotes two folio pages to the explanation of certain figures which occur in the inscriptions of the Catacombs, which he calls representations of the human heart. He illustrates the subject with much sacred and profane learning, and with many quotations from the Scriptures, the Fathers, and classic authors. Another archæologist, Boldoni, suggests that the figures signify the bitterest sorrow of heart—dolorem cordi intimum; and another believes them to be representations of a heart transpierced with a thorn, the symbol of profoundest grief. These mysterious figures, whose hidden meaning was sought with such empty toil—arcanam significationem inani labore investigarint, says De Rossi—were, however, nothing more than the leaf-decorations employed in both pagan and Christian inscriptions by way of punctuation! See the following example: