In the district that bore this designation, lying close to the Appian Way, the basilica of San Sebastiano was erected, and the extensive burial-vaults beneath that church - in which, according to tradition, the bodies of the apostles St Peter and St Paul rested for a year and seven months previous to their removal to the basilicas which bear their names - were, in very early times, called from it coemeterium ad catacumbas, or catacumbas alone.