GALLIA CHRISTIANA. - Abbreviated title of the well-known work in 13 folio volumes on the bishoprics of ancient Gaul, published in the 18th century by the Benedictines of the Congregation of St-Maur (Maurists). The bishoprics are distributed according to the ecclesiastical provinces, arranged in alphabetical order following the initial letters of their Latin names. A complete list of the dioceses contained in the G. C. is found in the Catalogue alphabétique des livres imprimés mis à la disposition des lecteurs dans la salle de travail, suivi de la liste des catalogues usuel du département des manuscrits (4th ed., Paris 1933; cf. also P. B. Gams, Series Episcoporum Ecclesiae catholicae, Ratisbon 1873, pp. 476-658). Each province is given a general historical notice; then each diocese has its own historical notice, the chronology of its bishops and dignitaries, and information on the abbeys that arose within its territory. At the end of the volume the instrumenta, or supporting documents, are reproduced. The work, despite the gaps, errors and defects found in it, is a monument of erudition and a working tool that is still today indispensable to historians of Christianity in Gaul. Msgr. L. Duchesne, with his 3 volumes of the Pastes épiscopaux de l'ancienne Gaule (Paris 1907-1910-15), revised with his vast and sure erudition the episcopal lists of the G. C. from the origins to the whole of the 9th century, sifting them of the dross that the meritorious Maurists had left in them.
Among the immediate precursors of this work various scholars must be counted, of whom the principal are: in Italy, Ferd. Ughelli, well-known author of the Italia Sacra (9 folio volumes, Rome 1644-62), by which the brothers de Sainte-Marthe were inspired; in France the priest Jacques Severt, who urged the bishops of France and of the whole Church to collect and publish the episcopal lists in his work: Chronologia historica successivis hierarchicae antistitum Lughunensis archiepiscopatus, Galliarum primatus et suffraganeorum dioecessos (1 vol. in-4, Lyon 1607); the lawyer Jean Cheno, author of the work: Archiepiscoporum et episcoporum Galliae chronologica historia, qua ordo eorundem a temporibus apostolorum inceptus ad nostra usque, per traducem succedentium servatus ostenditur (1 vol. in-4).
Paris 1621); the priest Claude Robert, who published the G. C. in qua Regni Franciae, ditionumque vicinarum dioecese, et in iis proscales, describuntur (1 vol. in-fol., ibid. 1626; note that he is the first to use the expression G. C.) and above all the twin brothers Scevola and Ludovico di Sainte-Marthe (Sammartani), to whom Robert entrusted the task of preparing the second edition of his work. The two scholars died in harness, but their work was made public by Scevola's sons, Pietro, Abele and Nicola: G. C., qua series omnium archiepiscoporum, episcoporum et abbatum Franciae vicinarumque ditionum, ab origine ecclesiarum ad nostra tempora per quatuor tomos deducitur et probatur ex antiquae fidei manuscriptis Vaticani, regum, principum, tabularis omnium Galliae Cathedralium et abbatiarum (2 vols. in-fol., ibid. 1656).
The general assembly of the French clergy of 1710, given the usefulness of the G. C. of the brothers di Sainte-Marthe, invited dom Denis de Sainte-Marthe (Sammartana) of the Benedictine Congregation of St-Maur to take up the work on a broader plan. The learned Benedictine accepted the task, and, aided by various confreres, in particular by dom Claude Estiennot and dom Jean Thiroux, began in 1715 the publication of the new G. C., with the volume comprising a long preface on the plan of the work and on the introduction of Christianity into Gaul and the episcopal lists of the ecclesiastical provinces of Albi, Aix, Arles, Avignon and Auch: G. C. in provincias ecclesiastica distributa qua series et historia archiepiscoporum, episcoporum et abbatum Franciae vicinarumque ditionum ab origine ecclesiarum ad nostra tempora deducitur, et probatur ex authenticis instrumentis ad calcem appostis (ibid. 1715; it should be noted that from vol. V onward, after abbatum, one reads: regionum omnium quas vetus Gallia complectebatur); vol. II is devoted to the provinces of Bourges and Bordeaux (ibid. 1720); vol. III to the provinces of Calais, Cologne and Embrun (ibid. 1725, the year of dom Denis's death); vol. IV to the province of Lyon (ibid. 1728); vol. V to Mainz and Mechelen (ibid. 1731); vol. VI to the province of Narbonne (ibid. 1739). With this volume dom Félix Hodin and dom Etienne Brice appear as directors of the work; vols. VII and VIII to the province of Paris (ibid. 1744); vols. IX and X to the province of Reims (ibid. 1751). The work suffered a delay because of the death in 1755 of the two directors; vol. XI to the province of Rouen (ibid. 1759) under the direction of dom Pierre Henri and dom Jacques Taschereau; vol. XII to the province of Sens and Tarentasia (ibid. 1770), vol. XIII to the provinces of Toulouse and Trier (ibid. 1785).
The Revolution interrupted the work, of which in 1790 the supporting documents of vol. XIV, devoted to the province of Tours, were being printed, but it was brought to completion by the lay scholar Barthélemy Hauréau, who published vols. XIV, devoted to the province of Tours (ibid. 1856); XV to the province of Besançon (ibid. 1860); XVI to the province of Vienne (ibid. 1865). These 3 vols. were called by the priest Tresvaux (Revue des questions historiques, 11 [1872], p. 210) Gallia profana, because of the secular spirit in which they were written.
Dom Paul Piolin accepted the task of publishing a second edition of the thirteen volumes prepared by the Maurists, but his work did not improve the work. Of the G. C. (source as above). Editio altera labore et curis Domini Pauli Piolin recentita et aucta only vols. I-V, XI and XIII were published in Paris between 1870 and 1877; the other volumes were reprinted anastatically by the publisher H. Welter (ibid. 1899). Canon J.-H. Albanès set out to correct the blunders that had escaped the first authors of the G. C., with his G. C. novissima, later published by his friend U. Chevalier. The idea, excellent in itself, turned out, because of the author's death, to be a practically useless hotchpotch for scholars. The volumes of the G. C. novissima number seven (in-4 format) and concern Provence: vol. I devoted to Aix, Apt, Fréjus, Gap, Riez and Sisteron (Montbéliard 1899); vol. II to Marseille (ibid. 1899); vol. III to Arles (ibid. 1901); vol. IV to Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux (ibid. 1909); vol. V to Toulon (ibid. 1911); vol. VI to Orange (ibid. 1916); vol. VII to Avignon (ibid. 1920). H. Fisquet published in Paris, between 1863 and 1869 in 22 vols. without date, a free version of the G. C., with additions on the modern state of the dioceses, under the title France pontificale (Gallia Christiania), histoire chronologique et biographique des archevêques et évêques de tous les diocèses de France, depuis l'établissement du Christianisme jusqu'à nos jours, divisée en dix-huit provinces ecclésiastiques (Paris). None of the projects proposed for the complete remaking of the G. C. has so far met with a happy outcome.