Scala Sancta (Holy Stairs)

Consisting of twenty-eight white marble steps, at Rome, near the Lateran; according to tradition the staircase leading once to the prætorium of Pilate at Jerusalem, hence sanctified by the footsteps of Our Lord during his Passion.

The historians of the monument relate that the Holy Stairs were brought from Jerusalem to Rome about 326 by St. Helena, mother of Constantine the Great. In the Middle Ages they were known as Scala Pilati, the Stairs of Pilate. From old plans it can be gathered that they led to a corridor of the Lateran Palace, near the Chapel of St. Sylvester, were covered with a special roof, and had at their sides other stairs for common use. When Sixtus V in 1589 destroyed the old papal palace and built the new one, he ordered the Holy Stairs be transferred to their present site, before the Sancta Sanctorum (Holy of Holies).