Sigüenza, Diocese of

SIGÜENZA, Diocese of. - City and diocese of Spain, suffragan of Toledo, situated in the civil province of Guadalajara and Soria and a small part in those of Saragossa and Segovia. It is the Segontia of the Celtiberians.

The patroness of the diocese is St. Librada. The diocese has an area of 9,814 sq. km., 175,000 inhabitants, all Catholic, distributed in 476 parishes, 245 diocesan priests and 33 regulars, 1 seminary, 3 male religious communities and 22 female ones (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 401).

The first known bishop is Protogenes, who took part in the famous Third Council of Toledo of 589, at which the total conversion of Spain was accomplished, in the presence of King Reccared. The names of the Arian bishops then converted are known; it seems therefore that Protogenes and a great part of his diocese were Catholic long before the Council. As happened in most Spanish dioceses during the Saracen domination, that of S. too was then sorely tried, so that the names of very few bishops are known from the 8th to the 11th century; but after the city was conquered in 1124 by Catholic arms, it took on new life, since King Alfonso VIII granted the prelates of Sigüenza dominion over the city.

The Cathedral, dedicated to the Assumption, was begun in 1124, that is, in the year of the expulsion of the Mohammedans, and precisely on the site where the ancient one had stood. The apse and the crossing belong to the 12th century, the lower naves to the 13th, the upper one to the 15th. On the whole it is a fine example of the Romanesque-Gothic transitional period. It contains the monumental tombs of Card. Carrillo de Albornoz (d. 1434), of Martin Vasquez called El Doncel (d. 1486) and of Msgr. Fernando de Arce, bishop of the Canaries (d. 1521). The Archive is very rich. The Seminary was erected in 1651. - See plate XXXIX.