TREBIZOND (TRAPESUNTE, TRABZON). - The Greek bishopric of T., later elevated to a metropolis, already existed at the time of the Council of Nicaea (325).
Under Diocletian, St. Eugenius, the future patron of the city, died there as a martyr. The development of Christian life was shown in the founding of not a few monasteries and famous churches. The bishops of T. took part in the ecumenical councils and in those of Constantinople. The bishopric followed the fate of Constantinople in the schism of the 11th century. After the erection of the small empire of T. by the Comneni in the 13th century, the city could no longer attain the power it had when it was part of the Byzantine Empire. However, with the Western powers and with Venice, Genoa, and Florence, T. several times cultivated relations established by treaties, and it sought support in the West, including from the Pope, when in the 15th century its very existence was threatened by the Turks, who destroyed the Empire of T. in 1461 (v. ORIENTE, IMPERO D. II. Impero latino d'Oriente).
The Latin bishopric of T. was erected in 1314, but already in the 15th century it became merely titular. A Franciscan convent is attested from the year 1314; it still existed in 1390; the same is known of a Dominican monastery. Later, in 1652, the Capuchins sought to carry out their apostolate from their mission in Georgia, but only in 1845 could the mission of T. be established, together with the nearby cities of Sinope and Samsun; the superior of the mission was granted the faculties of apostolic prefect. Later the Mechitarists and the Jesuits under Leo XIII came to the aid of those regions, as did also the Sisters of St. Joseph and the Armenian Sisters. The sad events that befell the Armenians in 1895 and in the First World War (1914-18) and the forced emigration of Christians from the regions around the Black Sea were very disastrous for the apostolic prefecture of T., which became a simple mission after the decree of 12 Sept. 1896 that abolished the Prefectures of the Apostolic Missions attached to the Eastern Churches. On 20 June 1931 a mission "sui iuris" was created at T. for the faithful of the Latin rite (AAS, 23 [1931], pp. 402-403), entrusted to the Capuchins.
The Catholic diocese of the Armenian rite (erected in 1850) was already vacant, impeded, and dispersed by 1932.
Among the illustrious figures of T., mention is made of Cardinal Bessarion, who wrote an Encomium in honor of his native city, edited by Spyr. Lampros in the journal Νέος Ἐλληνομένων, 13 (1916), pp. 145-204. At the Council of Florence the metropolitan Dorotheos subscribed to the bull of Union. In the first half of the 17th century the metropolitan Cyril embraced union with the Catholic Church and was for that reason expelled from his see (v. C. Giannelli, in Orientalia Christ. Periodica, 15 [1949], p. 167 ff.). Pontifical letters addressed to the Emperors of T., still preserved, date back to the years 1291, 1329, 1434, 1460. The abbot of the Mechitarists of Venice, Ignatius Ghiurekean, a native of T., was also a benefactor of T., founding a school there in 1876.
Bibliography4 works
Giorgio Hofmann