A Roman tomb long revered as that of St Paul has been opened to public viewing.
The tomb, last week authenticated as St Paul's, has been freed from a 19th-century block of cement that until now forced the faithful to bend down under the altar to see it.
Working from May to November, building workers opened a window in the cement to make the tomb visible, at least on one side.
The next stage in the work, said Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, will be to open the tomb.
"If we get Vatican permission we will certainly take the lid off the sarcophagus," said Montezemolo, the archpriest of the cathedral housing the tomb.
The architect who has supervised the dig, Giorgio Filippi, said there was "no doubt" the tomb was St Paul's.
He was somewhat cautious on what archaeologists might find inside the tomb, saying "it could contain anything".
According to Filippi, the tomb might even be a cenotaph (empty tomb), erected in the name of the saint and "assuming the same value of the tomb itself" - while not actually containing Paul's body.
Montezemolo said that, if tests are approved, they will probably examine the stone the sarcophagus is made of.
"But any future research will not have to prove that this is Paul's burial place, because there has been agreement on this for 2,000 years".
The tomb is located in a cathedral named after the saint, St Paul's Outside the Walls, about three kilometres outside the ancient walls of Rome.
It is the largest church in Rome after St Peter's.
Last week Filippi said his team had found the sarcophagus "exactly underneath the epigraph Paulo Apostolo Mart (Paul Apostle and Martyr) at the base of the cathedral's main altar".
"It has a hole on top through which pieces of cloth could be pushed, touching the relic and becoming holy in their turn," Filippi said.
Paul was a Roman Jew, born in Tarsus in modern-day Turkey, who started out persecuting Christians but later became possibly the greatest shaper of the Church.
He did not know Jesus in life but converted to Christianity after seeing a shining light on the road to Damascus.
The saint, who called himself the Apostle to the Gentiles, was a great traveller, visiting Cyprus, Asia Minor, mainland Greece, Crete, and Rome bringing the gospel of Jesus.
His 14 letters are largely written to churches which he had founded or visited.
They tell Christians what they should believe and how they should live but do not say much about Jesus' life and teachings.
Paul's influence on Christian thinking has, arguably, been more significant than any other single New Testament author.
His works were hugely influential on some of the great Christian thinkers and leaders of movements, including St Augustine and Martin Luther.
They have also been criticised by feminist writers for assigning women a subordinate role in the Church.
St Paul is the patron saint of Malta and the City of London and has also had several cities named in his honour including Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Saint Paul, Minnesota.
