SPEYER (SPIRA), DIOCESE OF. - City and diocese of Germany in the Palatinate. It has an area of 5,964 sq km with a population of 1,218,165 inhabitants, of whom 558,231 are Catholics, distributed in 307 parishes served by 529 diocesan priests and 46 regulars; it has a seminary, 7 male religious communities and 273 female ones (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 407).

SPEYER (SPIRA), DIOCESE of - Copper holy-water bucket with reliefs (first half of the 11th century) - Speyer.(from F. Witte, Tausend Jahre Gotticher Kunst am Rhein, II, Lipida u. a., t. 22)

On the beginnings of Christianity and on the first bishops of S. from the 4th to the 6th century there is no reliable information; at the Council of Paris of 10 Oct. 614 Bishop Ilderic was present (MGH, Concilia, I, p. 192). The regular list begins with Bishop Basinus and continues from there (d. 782); in the Carolingian period some bishops were also abbots of Wisenburg. Bishop David appears among those to whom a letter of Pope Zachary was addressed on 1 May 748; Bishop Gebehard is mentioned in a letter of Pope Nicholas I (858-63). The series of bishops from the end of the 11th century is in MGH, Scriptores, XIII, p. 219, and is reproduced by L. Duchesne in Fastes épiscopaux de l'ancienne Gaule, II, 2nd ed., Paris 1910, pp. 163-66. Among recent bishops are remembered Msgr. Joh. von Geissel (1836-41), later Archbishop of Cologne, the Benedictine Daniel Bonifaz von Haneberg (1872-76) and Michael von Faulhaber (1911-17), later Archbishop of Munich and Freising and cardinal.

S. was greatly benefited by King Sigebert III in 653, Childeric II (664-66), Charlemagne (782), by Emperor Otto I in 969; the emperors of the Salian dynasty had burials in the Cathedral; the diocese received rich gifts from Conrad II in 1032, from Henry III in 1056 and from Henry IV in the years 1063-65, 1074, 1086, 1087, in which he donated the abbeys of St. Lambert, of Lintburch, of Eschinewage and of Hornbach to Bilsenove in the diocese of Metz. Therefore the bishops of S. were always favorable to the Empire, so much so that Pope Gregory VII summoned Bishop Henry I to Rome in 1074 and suspended him in Feb. 1075.

The diocese comprised four archdeaconries; until 1803 S. was a suffragan of Mainz; in that year it was suppressed and, restored in 1817, it became a suffragan of Bamberg, after the boundaries of the diocese were limited to the left bank of the Rhine, that is, to a quarter of its ancient area.

The Cathedral dedicated to Mary Most Holy and to St. Stephen is already mentioned in a charter of King Childeric II (MGH, Diplomata Merovingica, XXVII, no. 28). The new Cathedral was begun by Conrad II in 1030 and, though not yet completed, was dedicated in 1061 (MGH, Scriptores, XIII, p. 732). Pope Victor II on 28 Oct. 1056 had buried Emperor Henry there and the Cathedral became a place of imperial burial. But in the 13th century, doubts being raised about its consecration, Bishop Frederick of Bolanden in 1281 reconsecrated the Cathedral. It suffered several fires and was almost destroyed in that of 1689; but it was always restored; it constitutes one of the most conspicuous products of Romanesque architecture for its imposing plan and its development; it has two opposed apses, and offers Lombard reminiscences in the external loggias, in the domes and in the bell towers. To S., at the time of Bishop Gunther von Henneberg (1146-61), St. Bernard went to preach the Crusade.

The episcopal Archive is rich in documents and diplomas. The Cathedral Library was destroyed by a fire in 1689; the episcopal one, very rich, was dispersed at the end of the 17th century by the French.

THE COLLEGIATE CHURCH OF ST. GERMAN

Although the Annales Spirenses write that King Dagobert had given the church of St. Germanus to monks (MGH, Scriptores, XII, p. 82), there is no reliable information about this church until the 12th century, in which the archdeacons are found as provosts of this collegiate church, which was sacked in 1422 and 1462; it was transferred to the church of St. Maurice in 1468 and then destroyed in 1794. Its archive is today in that of Munich (A. Pfeiffer-F. Klinom, Das Statutenbuch des St. Germanund St. Moritzstiftes, in Palatina-Almanach, 1925, pp. 21-25).

THE CHURCH OF ST. MARY

At Hördt, of the Order of St. Augustine, it was founded by a certain Hermann in the time of Henry III. The possessions and rights of this church were confirmed in 1155 by Pope Innocent II and by the Emperor Frederick I; it flourished until the 14th century. In 1525 it was ruined, and it was afterwards suppressed by the Elector Palatine from 1557; in 1625 the bishop transferred its foundation to the parish of Philippsburg. Some documents of the church are preserved in the Archive of Karlsruhe, among them the privilege of Innocent II (I. Baumann, Zur Geschichte von Hördt, Speyer 1909; G. Buindo, Zur Geschichte der Propstlei Hördt, in Blätter für Pfälzische Kirchengeschichte, 6 [1930], pp. 93-96).

Bibliography17 works

BIBL.: F. X. Remling, Gesch. der Bischöfe zu Speyer, Magonza 1852-54; id., Neuere Gesch. der Bischöfe von Speyer, ivi 1867; Eubel, I, p. 460; II, p. 265; III, p. 322; IV, p. 320; V, p. 362; O. Riedner, Die geistl. Gerichtshöfe zu Speier im Mittelalt., Paderborn 1915; L. Grönenwald, Die goldene Handsch. von Speyer, in Pfälz. Museum, 40 (1923), pp. 108-16; id., Schenkun-ges der Salischen Kaiser an die Kirchen in Speyer, in Palatina, 1925, n. 42 sgg.; L. Mezzetti, Die verfassungsrechtl. Stellung des Bistums und der Stadt Speyer zur Zeit des Bischofs Bernger von Entringen (1224-32) in Mittel. der hist. Vereins der Pfalz, 48 (1927); H. Schreibmüller, Name und Herkunft des Speyerer Bischofs Hermann (1975-90), in Pfälz. Museum, 43 (1927), pp. 93-95; K. Kloe, Die Wahlkapitulationen der Bischöfe zu Speyer, 1272-1862, Speyer 1928; id., Dom und Bistum Speyer. Literaturnachweis, in Pfälz. Museum, 47 (1930), pp. 157-74; E. Carlebach, Stadt und Bistum Speyer im Laufe der Jahrh., Heidelberg 1932; H. Weigert, Die Kaiserdome Speyer, Mainz und Worms, Berlino 1933; A. Brackmann, Germania Pontif., III, Berlino 1935, p. 88 sgg.

Enrico Josi

DIETS OF SPEYER

Two imperial diets were held at S. and presided over by Ferdinand, brother of Charles V, which had special importance in the religious affairs of Germany in the 16th century. In the first, of 1526, it was decided: "Until the convocation of a council or of a national assembly on the matters concerning the Edict published... at the Diet of Worms (1521), we have resolved and decided unanimously to live with our subjects, to govern and to conduct ourselves in such a way that each of us hopes and thinks he can answer before God and his imperial majesty." But the Lutheran princes interpreted this text in the sense of having full freedom to "reform" religion in their territories in the Lutheran sense.

At the Diet of 1529 (March 15-April 7) it was intended to put an end to this way of acting by proceeding in the opposite direction, and an "Imperial Proposition" was presented by which the princes were warned that they were forbidden to permit or favor religious innovations "under penalty of losing their States, rights, liberties and privileges." After bitter discussions three decisions were adopted: 1st, that the condemnation inflicted on Luther at Worms in 1521 should have full force; 2nd, that the Mass should absolutely not be suppressed; 3rd, that no State should use force against another under the pretext of religion. This last one struck, without naming him, the Landgrave of Hesse.

The Lutheran States did not bow to the decisions of the majority and raised a solemn protest, later transformed on April 25 into an "Instrument of Appeal"; hence their designation as Protestants, which became common for those who separated from the unity of the Church (v. PROTESTANTESIMO). - See plate LXXIV.