BOVA. - B. is a small town in the Aspromonte facing Cape Spartivento. Together with S. Lorenzo, Africo, Roccaforte, Condofuri and Roghudi, it forms a small ethnic island, with a language of purely Greek derivation.
It does not appear in classical antiquity, but only in the Byzantine-Norman period.
As a diocese, it does not figure in the Notitiae of the Diatiposi, for which reason it is doubted whether it is of Byzantine or Norman institution. Some think that B. and Oppido (v.) are Greek dioceses, instituted by the Normans, to compensate Reggio for the loss of Tuariana and Vibona, merged into the Latin diocese of Mileto and subject to the Holy See. But the policy of the Normans ill accords with this supposition: they never gave origin to a Greek diocese, but on the contrary, Latinized several Greek dioceses, beginning with Reggio. The existence of a bishop by the name of Luminoso, who in 649 subscribed to the Synod of Pope Martin, constitutes an undue supposition. He was in fact « Episcopus Bononiensis » and not « Bovensis », as some have read.
B. has always been a suffragan of Reggio and is the diocese that maintained the Greek rite the longest, suppressed only in 1574 by the bishop Giulio Stauriano.
In its territory there were many Greek monasteries, among them those of S. Leone, of S. Maria de Torreto, of S. Pantaleone, of S. Maria de Traiecto, of S. Niccolò de Alefido, etc. The patron of the diocese himself, St. Leo or Leontius, was a Greek monk, a native of B. or much more probably of Africo. Some also recall a St. Elias of B.; but this is St. Elias of Reggio, called lo Speleota, who lived in the 9th-10th century. The bones of St. Leo are venerated in the Cathedral, which is dedicated to St. Mary dell'Iaudia (Presentation). The town of B. does not exceed 2,500 inhabitants and has a rather wretched life; B. Marina, which is 12 km away, promises greater development. Its territory is very restricted and, altogether, does not exceed 30,000 inhabitants, scattered over 9 municipalities and 17 parishes. The archbishop of Reggio since 1941 has united ad personam the administration of B.