Trophimus, Archbishop of Arles, Saint

TROFIMO, PROTOVESCOVO DI ARLES, SANTO

Feast day: 29 December

TROPHIMUS, Archbishop of Arles, Saint. - Died before 251-52, the time when his successor Marcian accepted the schism of Novatian, as is evident from the letter written by St. Cyprian to Pope Stephen in 254 (PL 3, 1023-32). He is one of the seven missionary bishops sent from Rome to Gaul, remembered by St. Gregory of Tours (cf. Historia Francorum, I, 30: ed. W. Arndt - B. Krusch, in MGH, Script. rer. Merov., I, p. 48; E. Griffe, La Gaule, cited in bibl., pp. 72-75). Feast on Dec. 29.

Nothing is known of his life, and the legend of the apostolic origin of his mission was spread for interested purposes in the 5th century, when the question of the primacy of Arles was being agitated. Its principal promoter was Bishop Patroclus, an unscrupulous man and unfortunately a person well regarded by Pope Zosimus. The latter, in two letters of 417 (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 328, 332), evidently drafted on information from Patroclus himself, affirmed, without any chronological specification, that T. was the first missionary bishop of Gaul sent by the Apostolic See «ex cuius fonte totse Gallia fidei rivulos acceperunt» (n. 328). Emboldened by this statement, which was not accurate, the bishops of the province of Arles specified in a letter of 450 to St. Leo the Great that T. was sent to Arles by St. Peter (PL 54, 879). Caesarius of Arles in turn made T. a disciple of the Apostles and assigned him three companions, Paul of Narbonne, Saturninus of Toulouse and Daphnus of Vaison (cf. Libellus de mysterio sanctae Trinitatis, 17: ed. G. Morin, II, Maredsous 1942, p. 179). Finally Ado in the 9th century identified T. with the homonymous disciple of St. Paul, «ab apostolis Romae ordinatus episcopus» of Arles (cf. Libellus de festivitatibus Apostolorum, cited by H. Quentin, Les martyrologes historiques du moyen âge, Paris 1908, p. 603). T. has also been made one of the 72 disciples of Our Lord (BHL. 8319). The attempt to identify T. with Serapion of Alexandria does not deserve to be taken into consideration.

Bibliography8 works

BIBL.: Martyr. Romanum, p. 607; Tillemont, IV, 441-703-708; XIII, 678; L. Duchesne, Les fustes épisc. de l'anc. Gaule, 2nd ed., I, Paris 1907, pp. 60, 253-54; L. Levillain, St Trophime confess. et métropol. d'Arles et la mission des sept en Gaule, in Rev. d'hist. de l'Egl. de France, 13 (1927), pp. 145-89; E. Griffe, La Gaule chrét. à l'époque romaine, I: Des origines à la fin du IVe siècle, Paris-Toulouse 1947, pp. 52-53, 67-70. On the question of the primacy of Arles, cf. L. Duchesne, op. cit., pp. 86-142; Fliche-Martin-Fruta, IV, nn. 354-55, 368, 380-81; E. Griffe, La primatie d'Arles et les métropoles d'Aix et d'Embrun au Ve siècle, in Bull. de littér. eccl., 31 (1950), pp. 65-74.

A. Pietro Fruta

@incollection{ec12_trofimo_protovescovo_di_arles, author = {Frutaz, Amato Pietro}, title = {Trofimo, protovescovo di arles, santo}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {XII}, pages = {563--564}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1954}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/trofimo-protovescovo-di-arles-santo} }

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