KWEIYANG [GUIYANG], ARCHDIOCESE OF. - The civil province of Kweichow, in central-southern China, detached from the diocese of Nanking on 15 Oct. 1696 and erected as an apostolic vicariate, passed shortly afterward (in 1715) under the administration of the apostolic vicar of Szechwan, until it was reconstituted as the apostolic vicariate of Kweichow on 27 March 1846 and entrusted to the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris. On 3 Dec. 1924 it took its name from K., the capital city of the province and the residence of the Ordinary. On 16 Feb. 1922 it ceded 9 civil subprefectures to form, together with 4 other civil subprefectures of Kwangsi (v. NANNING), the mission of Lanlung (v.), and on 23 March 1932 it ceded another 27 civil subprefectures to give life to the sui iuris mission of Shihtsien (v.). With the establishment of the episcopal hierarchy in China, on 11 Apr. 1946, K. was elevated to a metropolitan archdiocese with the diocese of Lanlung as suffragan.
It has an area of 94,000 sq km. As of 30 June 1947, out of a total population of about 7,000,000 inhabitants, Catholics numbered 24,702 and catechumens 453. Besides the archbishop there were 49 Chinese priests and 16 foreign ones. In the preparatory seminary 25 students were studying, in the minor seminary 35, and in the major seminary 15 philosophers and 13 theologians. Among the auxiliary personnel there were 49 Chinese sisters and 17 foreign ones and a certain number of teachers and baptizers. The territory, divided into 5 districts, had 10 churches and 74 oratories, 31 primary stations and 410 secondary ones. The works consisted of 1 hospital with 40 beds, 2 orphanages with 37 inmates, 2 medical clinics, 2 secondary schools and 34 primary schools with a total of 3354 pupils.
Christianity, brought by immigrants from Szechwan in the 17th century, made progress only very late because of the persecutions that continued almost uninterruptedly until 1896. Many Christians were killed or suffered imprisonment and exile; among them should be remembered the martyrs beatified in 1900 and in 1905. Between 1896 and 1911 the mission made easy progress, but in 1926-27 it was again subjected to other scourges, among them famine and revolutionary turmoil.