Capuchin Crypt Ossury, Rome. The Capuchin Crypt is a small space comprising several tiny chapels located beneath the church of Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini on the Via Veneto near Piazza Barberini in Rome, Italy. It contains the skeletal remains of 3,700 bodies believed to be Capuchin friars buried by their order. When the friars arrived at the church in 1631, moving from the old monastery, they brought 300 cartloads of the remains of deceased friars. Fr. Michael of Bergamo oversaw the arrangement of the bones in the burial crypt. The soil in the crypt was brought from Jerusalem, by order of Pope Urban VIII. Here the Capuchins would come to pray and reflect each evening before retiring for the night. The crypt, or ossuary, contains the remains of 4,000 friars buried between 1500 and 1870, during which time the Roman Catholic Church permitted burial in and under churches. Good contrast and tonality. 7.25 x 10.25 in. 18.5 x 26 cm.