As soon as you get to the bottom of the steps, you will find yourself in an area between St Thomas Becket’s Oratory, which you will visit next, and St Magno’s Crypt. This area has long served as a burial place for some of Anagni’s most illustrious figures who aspired to being entombed under the Cathedral, in a sepulchre nearest the sacred place par excellence: the Crypt. The staircase accessible from the nave on the left, which you have just walked along, was a later addition, built in the course of the 17th century
The northerly and westerly walls, still bear votive panels depicting images of saints accompanied by minute kneeling donors.
The westerly panel, by the entrance to the Crypt, represents an unknown bishop together with St Magno and St Secondina, standing next to the Virgin and Child.
Two more panels are displayed on the northerly wall. On the first, from left to right, are St Oliva, St Nicholas of Mira, Archangel Michael, Christ in the act of blessing, St Peter the Apostle and St John the Baptist. The second panel depicts Christ in between St James and St John the Evangelist, who are in turn accompanied by their mother, Salome. Unfortunately, the faces of some of the figures were vandalised a few centuries ago, prior to the site becoming a museum.