St. Peter in Chains

The designation Saint Peter in Chains (Latin Sanctus Petrus ad Vincula; Italian San Pietro in Vincoli) does not identify a historical individual distinct from the Apostle Peter. It is a titular dedication used for churches and a traditional liturgical feast that commemorates an episode in the life of Saint Peter as recorded in the New Testament. In the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 12, Peter is imprisoned in Jerusalem by Herod Agrippa I during the days of Unleavened Bread. The night before he was to be brought out after Passover, an angel of the Lord appeared, the chains fell from Peter’s hands, and he was led past the sleeping guards; the iron gate opened of its own accord. This first-century narrative became the basis for later Christian devotion to the apostle under the title of his chains, rather than for any separate saint of that name.

In Rome, the basilica of San Pietro in Vincoli on the Oppian Hill has been associated with this tradition since late antiquity. According to accounts that circulated by the early Middle Ages, the Empress Licinia Eudoxia, daughter of Theodosius II and wife of the Western emperor Valentinian III, obtained from Constantinople the chains believed to have bound Peter in Jerusalem and brought them to Rome in the fifth century. Pope Sixtus III is credited with dedicating a church to house these relics, conventionally placed around 439–440. A further legend states that when the Jerusalem chains were placed beside those thought to have bound Peter in Rome’s Mamertine Prison (the Tullianum), the two sets of links fused miraculously into one. The existing basilica was substantially rebuilt in the fifteenth century under Pope Julius II; Michelangelo’s seated Moses, part of Julius’s unfinished tomb, remains in the church, and the chains are displayed in a reliquary under the high altar.

The same dedication was given to other churches across Europe. The Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula in the Tower of London, rebuilt in the early sixteenth century, served as the place of worship for the Tower’s garrison and prisoners and became the burial place of several high-profile Tudor-era executions, including Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard, Lady Jane Grey, and Sir Thomas More. Other churches of Saint Peter in Chains exist in Italy, England, and elsewhere. In the Roman liturgical calendar the feast of Saint Peter ad Vincula was kept on 1 August; it commemorated both the liberation of Peter and the dedication of the Roman basilica. The feast was removed from the General Roman Calendar in 1960 by Pope John XXIII, though it continues in some particular calendars and remains tied to the Roman station church of San Pietro in Vincoli.

Because “Saint Peter in Chains” is a title of the Apostle rather than the name of a separate saint, there is no independent biography, date of birth, or date of death attached to the designation. Veneration under this title is an extension of the cult of Peter, whose martyrdom in Rome is traditionally placed in the 60s of the first century under Nero. No reliable historical source treats “Peter in Chains” as a distinct person with his own life story, family, religious order, or ecclesiastical offices beyond those of the apostle himself.