Monopoli, Diocese of

MONOPOLI, Diocese of. - City and diocese in the province of Bari, immediately subject to the Holy See.

It has an area of 1,000.500 [square kilometers?] with an entirely Catholic population of 84,000 inhabitants; it has 17 parishes, 84 diocesan priests and 29 regulars (Ann. Pontificio, 1951, p. 274).

It is held that the diocese of Monopoli, which arose in the 11th century as a suffragan of Brindisi and later of Bari, had its origin after the destruction of the famous Roman Egnatia, of whose episcopate there is record from the very dawn of the 5th century. The hypothesis, though logical, still needs historical proof. The first bishop of M. was Adeodatus (1059), then Smaragdus (1067), Peter, who took part in the consecration of the church of Monte Cassino and subscribed the bull of Alexander II (1071), and Romuald (1073), who laid the foundations of the new cathedral. In 1091 Urban II made the Church independent and declared it immediately subject to the Holy See. Several times, in the history of the diocese, the dispute between the Chapter and the Pontiff over the election of the new bishop was accentuated. In 1227, for example, Honorius III consecrated John, annulling the election of an abbot of S. Maria Amalfitana made by the Chapter; and, after the death of Julius (between 1271 and 1275), the same Chapter split into two parties, one favoring a certain Hugh and the other a Guarino, archbishop of Brindisi. Martin IV then cut matters short and ordered an end to the already long vacancy of the see. Thus at last Paschal could be elected, confirmed also by the Pope. Other disputes arose over the appointment of N. Boccasigni (1309) and of F. Dionisio (1336), while Fra Giovanni de' Minori, elected in 1375, went over to the side of the antipope Clement VII, being confessor of Queen Joanna I. In 1818 Pius VII, after suppressing the episcopal see of Polignano, assigned it in perpetuity to M., under the bishop L. Villani of Ugento.

MONUMENTS

Thanks to its natural harbor, M. maintained very close commercial relations with the most important maritime cities from antiquity onward, and especially in the Middle Ages. Testimony to these relations is still found in the names of its most valuable monuments. The church of S. Maria Amalfitana, perhaps erected by a colony of Amalfitans over a Basilian grotto at the end of the 11th century or the beginning of the 12th, still preserves still well preserves its interior with 3 naves, divided by composite piers with fine Romanesque capitals and the terminal apses, of which the central one is most beautiful for its small half-columns with grotesque corbels and the large window refined by elements of Lombard art. The facade is of a modest Baroque; the Basilian laura on which the church was built was also redone.

The Cathedral, dedicated to St. Mercurius, built in 1107, now has the Baroque forms of the last remodeling (1742-70), but still preserves some good paintings: a St. Michael, perhaps by Palma il Giovane, to whom are also attributed the Madonna in Glory and the Sts. Roch and Sebastian (attributed by others to Palma il Vecchio); a Circumcision by Marco da Siena, a St. Jerome, disputed between Gentile Bellini and L. Bastiani, and other works by F. De Mura, G. Bonito and P. Finoglio. Fragments of the ancient church are in the sacristy, among which two archivolts and an architrave are of notable value: the first adorned with 12 busts of angels, the second with floral motifs, the third with rough sculptures strongly imbued with Northern manners, representing various scenes in bas-relief (Deposition; Marys at the Tomb; Descent into Limbo, etc.). The archive is rich with as many as 307 parchments, beginning from the year 1180.

Pasquale Testini