CESENA, Diocese of. - In Emilia, in the province of Forlì, suffragan of Ravenna. The episcopal lists of Cesena prior to the 6th century do not rest on solid historical foundations, and the first bishop of whom there is record is Natale, of the second half of the 6th century, followed by a Concordio in 603, both mentioned in a letter of St. Gregory the Great and Marinianus, bishop of Ravenna (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 1919): probably dependent on Ravenna from that period onward, it certainly was so in 649, when it formed part of the exarchate.
Among the other prelates of C. who are mentioned, note should be taken of Florus, present at the Roman Synod of 680 under Pope Agatho; St. Maurus, protector of C., who held the see in the 10th century and whose life was written by St. Peter Damian; his successor, a nephew of his named Constantius; Bishop John II, to whom St. Peter Damian sent the opuscule De parentelae gradibus; Gebizo, formerly monk and abbot of the monastery of Sts. Boniface and Alexis de Urbe, legate of Gregory VII and created cardinal by him; Benno de' Cocliti, d. 1149, also a cardinal, employed by Honorius II on various legations. Until the 11th century it formed part of the patrimony of the Holy See, then governed itself as a free commune. After the fall of the Swabians, C. again became part of the pontifical possessions, subsequently passing under the rule of the Ordelaffi, driven out by Card. Albornoz in 1357. After the sackings suffered during the expedition of Robert of Geneva, sent by Gregory XI to subdue the city, C. finally enjoyed a period of prosperity under the Malatesta, who governed it for a century (1378-1466). To make the new fortress of C. more spacious, Galeotto Malatesta had the Cathedral, situated on the Garampo hill, demolished in 1385; his successor Andrea had it rebuilt later on its present site (1408-12). C. was once again under papal dominion, at the time of the pontificate of Julius II, from whom it received municipal statutes, by which the city governed itself until the advent of the French Revolution. The diocese, small in territorial extent, was considerably enlarged by Pius VI in 1777 with new parishes taken from the jurisdiction of Rimini.
Among the bishops who in rather recent times brought distinction to the see of C., note should be taken of Pietro Francesco Orsini (1680-86), who later became Pope Benedict XIII; Card. G. C. Denhoff (1686-97); Card. Carlo Bellisomi (1795-1808), a candidate for the tiara in the Conclave of 1799; Card. S. F. Castiglioni, later Pope Pius VIII.
Pius VI and Pius VII were natives of C.
Among the monasteries of the diocese, there were once famous that of Sts. Lawrence and Zeno, known since the time of Gregory the Great and governed by the Benedictines until 1402; the monastery of St. Mary of the Mount, or Mount of St. Maurus, of very ancient though uncertain origin, also Benedictine, in which Bishop St. Maurus was deposed in 946; confirmed in 1244 by Innocent IV to the bishop of Cervia, united by Nicholas V in 1453 to the Congregation of St. Justina of Padua, restored in 1814 and 1887.
The diocese measures 400 sq. km., has 64 parishes, 126 diocesan priests, and 51 regulars, and 90 thousand Catholics out of 97,000 inhabitants (1948). - See Pl. LXXXIII.
