Ancient Diocese of Alais

This is not the diocese of Ales-Terralba in Italy, nor the Ancient Diocese of Alet in south-west France
Alès Cathedral

The former French Catholic diocese of Alais (now written Alès, and in Latin: Alesiensis) was created in 1694, out of territory previously part of the diocese of Nîmes. It was suppressed after the French Revolution, with its territory being divided between the diocese of Avignon and the diocese of Mende.[1] Its seat was Alès Cathedral.

History

Arisitum

About 570, Sigebert, King of Austrasia, created a see at Arisitum for a bishop named Monderic, taking fifteen parishes to create a territory for him. Monderic had originally been consecrated as a coadjutor for Bishop Tetricus of Langres, who had suffered a stroke. The understanding, however, was that he would serve as Archpriest of Tonnerre in the diocese of Langres, until Bishop Tetricus died. But in the war between King Guntram and King Sigibert, Monderic had given gifts and furnished supplies for Sigibert, and so he was sent into exile super ripam Rhodani in turri quadam arcta atque detecta, ('by the bank of the Rhone in a certain small tower that had lost its roof') in which he was held for two years cum grandi cruciatu ('with great discomfort'). Archbishop Nicetius, who was the bishop of Lyon and Metropolitan of the diocese of Langres, intervened on his behalf and sheltered him in Lyon for two months. Unable to get his original place restored, Monderic fled to King Sigibert, who assigned him the fifteen parishes and the village of Arisitum, which had once belonged to the Goths but at the time was in the diocese Bishop Dalmatius of Rodez. When Bishop Tetricus of Langres died, Gregory of Tours' kinsman Silvester was chosen to succeed him, and he proceeded to Lyon for consecration.[2] The identification of Alais with 'Arisitum' was argued by Auguste Longnon, on very slender evidence.[3] There are several other possibilities,[4] as Louis Duchesne notes.[5] The geography seems better suited to Neustrasia and to Aquitaine rather than to the lower parts of the Rhone valley.

A Bishop of Arisitum named Emmo is said to have participated in the Council of Clichy in 627,[6] but neither the name Emmo nor the diocese Arisitum appear in the subscription list of that Council.[7] His name does appear as a participant in a synod held at Reims, but only in Flodoard's Historia ecclesiae Remensis.[8] This synod is not dated, and its acts quoted by Flodoard, do not appear in collections of church councils and synods. Louis Duchesne has noticed that the acts quoted by Flodoard are actually borrowed from the Council of Clichy in 627.[9]

It is surmised that, in the eighth century, when Septimania was annexed to the Frankish Empire, the Diocese of Alais was suppressed and its territory returned to the Diocese of Nîmes.[10] It is also stated that the diocese was handed over to the diocese of Metz.[11]

Alais

Huguenot control (purple) and influence (violet), 16th century

After the Edict of Nantes, Alais was one of the places de sûreté given to the Huguenots.[12] In 1620 a national assembly of the Protestant churches of France was held at Alais. In 1623 Alais joined the side of the Duc de Rohan, and strengthened the fortifications of the town.[13] Louis XIII took back the town on 17 June 1629, after a nine-day siege, and the Convention of Alais, was signed on 29 June of that year with Rohan and Soubise, which suppressed the political privileges of the Protestants. On 17 October 1685, Louis XIV issued the Edict of Fontainebleau, revoking the Edict of Nantes and ordering the closing of Huguenot churches and schools. Parliament ratified the decree on 22 October.[14] In 1689 the King ordered his military architect Vauban to reconstruct the fortress of Alais, which had been destroyed on orders of Louis XIII.

At the request of Louis XIV, a see was created at Alais by Pope Innocent XII, on 16 May 1694, in a bull entitled Animarum Zelus.[15] The bull specifically states that a major motive of King Louis was the rooting out of heresy. The King had nominated François de Saulx as the first bishop of Alais as early as August 1687,[16] but the diplomatic rupture between the Papacy and France, due to the Gallican Articles of 1682 and the seizure of Avignon on 29 September 1688,[17] made it impossible for French nominees to obtain their bulls from Rome as long as Pope Innocent XI lived. Innocent's successor, Pope Alexander VIII (1689–1691) followed the same policy as far as bishops who had cooperated with the creation of the Gallican Articles was concerned.[18] It was only in 1693 that Louis XIV rescinded the Four Articles and made his formal retraction in a letter to the Pope. In June 1694 he gave his formal consent to the creation of the diocese of Alais, and ordered the Parliament of Toulouse to register his decree.[19]

The new diocese of Alais was to be composed of ninety parishes, divided into seven deaneries, each headed by an Archpriest: Alais, Anduse, La Salle, S. Hippolyte, Sumène, Vigan, and Mayrueis.[20] There were five religious houses, of both sexes. There was a foundation of Benedictine monks at Nôtre-Dame de Sendras (Cendras), and another at Saint-Pierre de-Salve (Sauve). A convent of Cistercian nuns was established at the monastery of Nôtre-Dame de Font-aux-Nonnains, north of Alais in the village of Saint-Julien-les-Valgagues.[21]

A new cathedral was needed for the new diocese. The Collegiate Church (Basilica) of Saint John the Baptist was chosen.[22] It already had a staff of ten Canons, led by a Dean and a Sacristan. This was not a sufficient number, however, for the dignity of a cathedral. A union with the Canons of the secular abbey of Aigues-Mortes, which had three dignities and fifteen Canons, was therefore negotiated; the Dean of Aigues-Mortes would become the Dean of Alais, but he would immediately resign, and the office of Dean would be abolished.[23] The new Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist had a Chapter consisting of five dignities (Provost, Grand Archdeacon of Alais, the Archdeacon, the Cantor, Sacristan and Succentor) and eighteen Canons (eight from Alais and ten from Aigues-Mortes).[24]

In 1721 a pestilence, carried north from Marseille, struck Alais, and afflicted the population for more than a year. Bishop Charles de Bannes d'Avéjan, who happened to be in Paris, procured aid from the King and took measures in the town against disease.

In 1724 Bishop d'Avéjan presided over the founding of the Collège d'Alais (a high school).

In 1727 Bishop d'Avéjan established a 'refuge' for retired prostitutes in Alais, directed by the religious of the Order of Notre-Dame du Refuge.[25]

Bishop d'Avéjan's sister, Anne-Elisabeth de Banne d'Avéjan, was Abbess of Alais (Nôtre-Dame de Font-aux-Nonnains). She died on 11 November 1774, in her 95th year.[26]

The future Cardinal de Bausset, the biographer of François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon (1810), of Cardinal Alexandre-Angélique de Talleyrand (1821), and of Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (1819–1824), was Bishop of Alais from 1784 to 1790.

In 1790 the National Constituent Assembly decided to bring the French church under the control of the State. Civil government of the provinces was to be reorganized into new units called 'départements', originally intended to be 83 or 84 in number. The dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church were to be reduced in number, to coincide as much as possible with the new departments. Since there were more than 130 bishoprics at the time of the Revolution, more than fifty dioceses needed to be suppressed and their territories consolidated. Clergy would need to take an oath of allegiance to the State and its Constitution, specified by the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, and they would become salaried officials of the State. Both bishops and priests would be elected by special 'electors' in each department. This meant schism, since bishops would no longer need to be approved (preconised) by the Papacy; the transfer of bishops, likewise, which had formerly been the exclusive prerogative of the pope in canon law, would be the privilege of the State; the election of bishops no longer lay with the Cathedral Chapters (which were all abolished), or other responsible clergy, or the Pope, but with electors who did not even have to be Catholics or Christians. The diocese of Alais was one of the dioceses which was suppressed, and its territory was transferred to a new diocese centered at Nîmes, and called the 'Diocèse du Gard'.[27] Bishop Louis-François de Bausset no longer had a diocese, and he had a competitor in the form of the new 'Constitutional Bishop' of Gard, Jean Baptiste Dumouchel, Rector of the University of Paris.[28]

After the signing of the Concordat of 1801 with First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte, the diocese of Alais was not revived, but abolished by Pope Pius VII in his bull Qui Christi Domini of 29 November 1801.[29]

Bishops

See also

References

  1. ↑ David M. Cheney, Catholic-Hierarchy.org, Alès (Alais) (Diocese) [Catholic-Hierarchy]
  2. ↑ Gregory of Tours, Historia Francorum Book V, chapter 5, in: J.-P. Migne (ed.), Patrologiae Latinae Tomus LXXI (Paris 1858), p. 321.
  3. ↑ Auguste Longnon (1878). Géographie de la Gaule au VIe siècle (in French). Paris: Hachette. pp. 538–542, at 542.
  4. ↑ E.g. Victor de Bonald, Notice historique sur l'évêché d'Arsat [Arisitum]," Mémoires de la Société des lettres, sciences et arts de l'Aveyron. 2. Rodez: N. Ratery. 1840. pp. 399–427. Paul Alaus, "Recherches historiques sur le Vicus Arisitensis de Grégoire de Tours et le très ancien évêché d'Arisitum [Arre]," Bulletin de la Société archéologique, scientifique et littéraire de Béziers. deuxième série. 14. Beziers: Chapte et Savardes. 1887. pp. 15–25. Louis Saltet, "L'évêché d'Arisitum," Bulletin de litterature écclesiastique, publié par l'Institut Catholique de Toulouse 2 (1902), 220-231.
  5. ↑ Louis Duchesne (1907). Fastes épiscopaux de l'ancienne Gaule: I. Provinces du Sud-Est (in French) (second ed.). Paris: Fontemoing.
  6. ↑ Duchesne, p. 317, with note 1.
  7. ↑ C. De Clercq, Concilia Galliae, A. 511 – A. 695 (Turnhout: Brepols 1963), pp. 296-297.
  8. ↑ Flodoard, Historia ecclesiae Remensis, Book II, chapter 5. Patrologiæ cursus completus. Series latina (in Latin). Tomus CXXXV. Paris: Apud Garnieri Fratres, editores et J.-P. Migne successores. 1853. p. 102.
  9. ↑ De Clercq, p. 298, who remarks, "Hic ergo omittendum videtur." ('It seems this (synod) should be omitted')
  10. ↑ Duchesne, p. 317.
  11. ↑ Marc Antoine François Gaujal (1859). Études historiques sur le Rouergue (in French). Tome III. Paris: P. Dupont. p. 242.
  12. ↑ Catherine de Médicis had already given it to Henry of Navarre in 1579. The anonymous Notes sur Alais ancien (1813), p. 11.
  13. ↑ The anonymous Notes sur Alais ancien (1813), p. 12.
  14. ↑ Geoffrey Adams (2006). The Huguenots and French Opinion, 1685-1787: The Enlightenment Debate on Toleration. Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. pp. 8–12. ISBN 978-0-88920-904-6.
  15. ↑ Bullarum diplomatum et privilegiorum sanctorum romanorum pontificum (in Latin). Tomus XX. Turin: A. Vecco et Sociis editoribus. 1870. pp. 623–630.
  16. ↑ Jean, p. 256.
  17. ↑ Steven C. A. Pincus (2014). 1688: The First Modern Revolution. New Haven CT USA: Yale University Press. pp. 122–124. ISBN 978-0-300-15605-8. James R. Pollock (1984). François Genet: The Man and His Methodology. Rome: Gregorian Biblical BookShop. pp. 25, 58–65, 100–102. ISBN 978-88-7652-541-4.
  18. ↑ Joseph Bergin (2004). Crown, Church, and Episcopate Under Louis XIV. Yale University Press. pp. 257–260. ISBN 978-0-300-10356-4.
  19. ↑ Gallia christiana VI, Instrumenta, pp. 261-262.
  20. ↑ Gallia christiana VI, Instrumenta, pp. 233-234.
  21. ↑ Jean, p. 258. Gallia christiana VI, p. 524.
  22. ↑ The church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste had been converted into a Collegiate Church by Pope Sixtus IV in 1472. The anonymous Notes sur Alais ancien (1813), p. 11.
  23. ↑ Gallia christiana VI, p. 515-516; and Instrumenta, pp. 230-233.
  24. ↑ Ritzler-Sefrin, VI, p. 74 note 1. Cf. the bull of Pope Innocent XII: Gallia christiana VI, Instrumenta, p. 257.
  25. ↑ Ernest Dadre, in: Mémoires & comptes-rendus de la Société scientifique & littéraire d'Alais (in French). Année 1906. Alais: J. Brabo. 1907. p. 50.
  26. ↑ Journal politique ou gazette des gazettes (in French). Bouillon. 1774. p. 83.
  27. ↑ Paul Pisani (1907). Répertoire biographique de l'épiscopat constitutionnel (1791-1802). (in French). Paris: A. Picard et fils. pp. 335–337.
  28. ↑ Pisani, p. 336.
  29. ↑ Pius VI; Pius VII (1821). Collectio (per epitomen facta,) Bullarum, Brevium, Allocutionum, Epistolarumque, ... Pii VI., contra constitutionem civilem Cleri Gallicani, ejusque authores et fautores; item, Concordatorum inter ... Pium VII. et Gubernium Rei publicae, in Galliis, atque alia varia regimina, post modum in hac regione, sibi succedentia; tum expostulationum ... apud ... Pium Papam VII., Contra varia Acta, ad Ecclesiam Gallicanam, spectantia, a triginta et octo Episcopis, Archiepiscop. et Cardinal. antiquae Ecclesiae Gallicanae, subscriptarum, etc. 6 Avril, 1803 (in Latin). London: Cox & Baylis. pp. 111–121. Ritzler-Sefrin, VI, p. 206, note 1.
  30. ↑ De Saulx: Jean, p. 256. Ritzler-Sefrin, Hierarchia catholica V, p. 76 with note 2.
  31. ↑ Henin-Liétard was nominated by King Louis XIV on 23 January 1713, and approved by Pope Clement XI on 28 April 1713. He was consecrated on 3 July 1713. Henin-Liétard was nominated to the diocese of Embrun on 1 November 1719, for which papal approval was granted on 27 May 1720. Jean, p. 257. Ritzler-Sefrin, V, p. 76 with note 3; 191.
  32. ↑ D'Avéjan was nominated by King Louis XV on 8 January 1721, and preconised (approved) by Pope Benedict XIV on 16 June. He was consecrated on 17 July by his predecessor, Louis François-Gabriel de Henin-Liétard. He was also Abbot of the Abbey of Montebourg, and Prior in commendam of the Priory of Saint Leu and of the Priory of Saint Sauveur-lez-Bray. He died in Paris on 23 May 1744 at the age of 56. Jean, p. 257. Ritzler-Sefrin, V, p. 76 with note 3.
  33. ↑ A native of Nîmes, Louis-François de Vivet de Montclus, Marquis de Montpezat, had previously been Bishop of Saint-Brieuc (Brittany) from 1728 to 1744. He was consecrated a bishop at Senlis on 9 March 1728 by Bishop François Firmin Trudaine. He was nominated to the diocese of Alais by King Louis XV on 13 September 1744, and preconised (approved) by Pope Benedict XIV on 18 December 1744. He died at Alais on 21 July 1755. Charles Guimart (1852). Histoire des évêques de Saint-Brieuc (in French). Saint-Brieuc: Prud'homme. pp. 145–147. Jean, p. 257. Ritzler-Sefrin, V, p. 127; VI, p. 74 with note 2.
  34. ↑ Beauteville held a licenciate in theology (Paris). He was educated by the Benedictines of Sorèze and the Doctrinaires of Toulouse, who were Jansenist, and had previously been Vicar General of the bishop of Mirepoix. He was nominated bishop of Alais on 16 November 1755 by King Louis XV, and preconised (approved) by Pope Benedict XIV on 16 February 1755. He was an opponent of the bull Unigenitus of Pope Clement XI. He died on 25 March 1776. Jean, p. 257-258. Ritzler-Sefrin, VI, p. 74 with note 3.
  35. ↑ Cortois resigned on 20 June 1784, and was named Archbishop of Nîmes on 25 June 1784 by Pope Pius VI. Léon Ménard; Étienne Goiffon (1873). Les évêques de Nîmes au XVIIIe siècle (in French). Nimes: L. Bedot. pp. 179–182. Jean, p. 258. Ritzler-Sefrin, VI, p. 74 with note 4.
  36. ↑ At the end of 1791 Bausset fled France for Switzerland, but he returned in September 1792. He was imprisoned during the Terror. Bausset resigned the diocese of Alais on 22 September 1801. The abolition of the diocese of Alais was not recognized by the Papacy until 29 November 1801. He was named a Canon of Saint-Denis in 1806, and created a cardinal in 1817. He died in Paris on 21 June 1824. François Pérennès (1851). Dictionnaire de biographie chrétienne...: A-D (in French). Tome premier. Paris: Migne. pp. 443–444. Jean, p. 258. Ritzler-Sefrin, VI, p. 74 with note 5.

Bibliography

Reference works

Studies

Acknowledgment

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Nîmes". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton. 

Coordinates: 44°07′25″N 4°04′35″E / 44.1235°N 4.0763°E / 44.1235; 4.0763

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