The Carcer Tullianum

The Carcer Tullianus, also known as the Mamertine Prison, is the oldest surviving jail in Rome, at the northern edge of the Forum Romanum. The double chamber cut into the rock dates to the 3rd century BC and held political prisoners and prisoners of war before execution. By Roman tradition, Vercingetorix was strangled here after Caesar's triumph and Jugurtha of Numidia starved to death. Christian tradition identifies the lower cell as the place where the apostles Peter and Paul were held, making the church of San Giuseppe dei Falegnami above it a pilgrimage site. Today visitors descend into the bare tufa chamber, read inscription tablets of Roman magistrates, and see the depression said to be the spring with which Peter baptised his jailers.