Córdoba, Diocese of

CÓRDOBA, Diocese of. - City, provincial capital and diocese of Spain in Andalusia; the Corduba of the Romans in Baetica (Hispania ulterior). Since this city was so flourishing in the first centuries of the empire, it is to be supposed that it received the Christian religion very early.

The martyrs of C. are thus commemorated by Prudentius: «Cordoba Acisclum dabit et Zoillum tresque coronas» (Peristephanon, IV, 19-20). The Jeronymian Martyrology commemorates on Nov. 18 the martyr Acisclus; two manuscripts add the note «hac die rosæ ibidem colligantur». The inscription carved on the column of Carmona (6th century) says of him: «donní Aciscl» (E. Hübner, Inscriptiones Hispaniae Christianae, Berlin 1871, no. 374). From the calendar of the year 961 it appears that St. Acisclus had three churches in C., one on his tomb, «in ecclesia Carceratorum», another belonged to the parchment workers, the third was in the monastery of Armila (M. Ferotin, Le «Liber ordinum» en usage dans l'Eglise visigothique et mozarabe d'Espagne, Paris 1904, p. 487). Zoillus is indicated on June 27 by the Jeronymian Martyrology, by the Mozarabic calendars and by the liturgical books (M. Ferotin, op. cit. pp. 568-69). The martyr was buried «in vico Cris»; he was later translated into the city «in ecclesia vici Tiraceorum».

St. Victoria, now co-patroness of C., appears for the first time together with St. Acisclus in the prologue of the antiphonary of León, which is of the year 1066 (E. Florez, España Sagrada, Madrid 1747-75, V, pp. 288-303).

The «tres coronae» are the martyrs Faustus, Gennarus and Martial, whom the Jeronymian Martyrology marks on Oct. 13; in the inscription of Carmona they have the title of «dominorum trium»; another, of the year 622, says «tres fratres sanctos retinet quos Cordoba passos» (E. Hübner, op. cit., no. 363). The calendar of the year 961 indicates their burial in a basilica outside the city «in vico Turris». Inside there was another church in their honor, mentioned by St. Eulogius (Memoriale Sanctorum, II, 9: PL 115, 776). On St. Eulogius of C. v. J. Pérez de Urbel, San Eulogio de Córdoba, Madrid 1928.

The name of Severus, bishop of C., is mentioned in the second half of the 3rd century, but nothing certain is known; on the other hand, the apostolate of the great Hosius, confessor of the faith, is most celebrated in the history of the Church; he attended the Council of Elvira (ca. 300) and was president and papal legate at the First Ecumenical Council held at Nicaea in 325 against the Arians; he also presided at the Council of Sardica (342 or 343). When Hosius died at the age of a hundred at Sirmium in 357, after sixty years of glorious pontificate, his successor was Hyginus, or Adyginus, the first opponent of the Priscillianist heresy according to the testimony of Sulpicius (but he later passed to the opposing party, which earned him excommunication and exile), and also an adversary of the Luciferians. In some catalogues of the bishops of Spain, the bishops Gregory and Isidore are given as successors of Hyginus, despite some difficulties that remain unresolved; certainly in the year 504 a prelate of that diocese was named Stephen, and he was present at the Roman Council held in that year by Pope Symmachus. In the period of the Arian domination of the Visigoths nothing is known of the diocese and its bishops; at the Second Council of Toledo of 588, where the total conversion of the Spanish people with their sovereign Clovis was proclaimed, a bishop of C. appears again under the name of Agapius, who also subscribed at the First Council of Seville after St. Leander. During the government of Bishop Zacchaeus the Moorish invasion took place (711), and the Moors made C. the capital of their kingdom for several centuries; the Christians then had much to suffer and the martyrs were not few, chiefly under King 'Abd ar-Rahmān II (ca. 824). On the occasion of the persecution provoked by the zeal of some Christians, a council was convened in C. in the year 852, in which spontaneous presentation for martyrdom was forbidden. Shortly afterwards, under Bishop Sauli, another council was held for the extinction of a schism among the faithful of the city; his successor Valens celebrated a third one (ca. 862). When C. was conquered by King St. Ferdinand in 1236, the episcopal see was re-established, after almost three centuries of vacancy, under Bishop Lupo de Fitero. The great mosque, which had been begun in 785 by 'Abd ar-Rahmān, was then transformed into a church; columns from Roman monuments of the city had been used in it; it had been enlarged in the year 961 by al-Hakam II. The transformation was carried out in 1593 by Hernan Ruiz, who erected the bell tower on the minaret. Other notable churches are: S. Marina, S. Lorenzo, S. Nicola de la Villa, S. Andrea, S. Agostino, S. Paolo, S. Marta, il Crocifisso, S. Michele, built on the site where the seat of the Senate stood in Roman times, the church of S. Giacomo erected on the Roman circus; the churches of Tutti i Santi on the theatre, of S. Nicola on the temple of Apollo, of the Trinity on the temple of Bacchus. The monastic communities withdrew from C. during the fierce Arab persecution of the year 852. The church of S. Michele de Escalada was built by monks of C. who had taken refuge there in 914 (Gomez Moreno, Iglesias Mozarabes, Madrid 1919, pp. 141-61; V. Lamperez, Historia de la Arquitectura cristiana española, I, Madrid 1930, p. 256). Distinguished sanctuaries of the diocese are those of the Most Holy Virgin de la Sierra, founded in the 13th century; of the Most Holy Virgin de Araceli in Lucena (feast 8 September), founded in 1600; of the Most Holy Virgin de Luna Pozoblanco (feast on the Sunday of Pentecost); of Our Lady de Guia in Alcaracejos.

Of Roman origin in C. is the great bridge over the Guadalquivir (240 m long with 16 arches), disfigured in the Arab period. The bridge was defended ab antiquo by a fortress, the Calahorra.

The diocese is a suffragan of Seville, has an area of 15,097 sq km, 126 parishes, 195 diocesan priests and 90 regulars; out of 995,150 inhabitants, 995,000 Catholics (1948). The patrons of the diocese are St. Acisclus and St. Victoria.

Enrico Josi-Giuseppe Pouy Marti