CONZA. — It is ancient Compsa, in the land of the Hirpini. Having passed from Roman to Gothic, Byzantine, and Lombard rule, in 1076 it became part of the Norman kingdom. The first information concerning the Church of C. dates from 743; Bishop Pelagius subscribed to a Roman synod held in that year, but it is very probable that the Church was older.
In the Hieronymian Martyrology, under 30 October, one reads in Comsa Maximi, but this concerns a martyr whose name is closely connected with Cuma in Campania, where medieval hagiographic and martyrological tradition places the cult of Maximus. Toward the end of the 10th century, C. was a simple bishopric. On 12 July 989, Pope John XV decreed that the bishop of C. should be consecrated by the archbishop of Salerno. On 20 July 1908, the first testimony appears of C.’s archiepiscopal dignity; Salerno was its primatial see. By an apostolic constitution of 30 September 1921, the archdiocese of C. was divided; of the 24 towns that had previously belonged to it, 11 remained, while 13 were assigned to the diocese of Campagna, immediately subject to the Holy See.
C., while retaining its rights and privileges as a metropolitan church, was united with the diocese of S. Angelo dei Lombardi and Bisaccia, founded in the 12th century, whose Ordinary bears the title and honor of archbishop of C. and bishop
of S. Angelo, Bisaccia and, at present, Lacedonia (united ad personam). C. has 40,000 inhabitants; S. Angelo 30,000; Bisaccia 17,000; the priests number, respectively, 40, 30, and 16 (1948). At Materdomini (Caposela) there was a college of the Redemptorist Fathers, where St. Gerardo Maiella died; today it is a shrine and destination for numerous pilgrimages.