hierarchical jurisdiction. In modern times we are accustomed to think of these as connected. Among the Uniates they go together. It was not so in the first eight centuries. Then groups of people in a foreign land kept their own rite, but were subject to the jurisdiction of the local bishops. So in Lower Italy, all the bishops, whatever rite they may have used, were subject to the Pope, not only as Patriarch, but also as Metropolitan.
In the first place there was no question of being subject to any authority of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Till the first Council of Constantinople (381) the Bishop of Constantinople had no claim to any jurisdiction beyond his own diocese at all. Even then he only got an honorary position which involved no jurisdiction. It is not till Chalcedon (451) that we find the beginning of what can be called a Byzantine Patriarchate; and then it was defined clearly as covering the provinces of Asia and Thrace. There was no suggestion of jurisdiction in Italy. As far as Patriarchal jurisdiction goes, as soon as the concept of Patriarchal jurisdiction was evolved, all Italy, including the South, without distinction of rite, looked to Rome. The Pope's legate at Nicæa (325), Hosius of Cordova, signs in the name of "the Church of Rome and the Churches of Italy, Spain, and all the West."[1] Indeed, as we shall see, when the usurpation of the Byzantine Patriarch in Lower Italy began (in the eighth century), his defenders admitted frankly that this was a new claim, and they tried to find excuses why these dioceses should be taken from the jurisdiction of Rome and handed over to that of Constantinople.[2]
But, more than this, the Pope was head of the Sees of Southern Italy and Sicily, not only as Patriarch, but as their immediate Metropolitan. There is an important point to realize about this. It was certainly rare that any Metropolitan province should be so great. However, it was so; all Southern Italy and even Sicily was included in the Roman province during the first seven centuries. This explains a point often misunderstood. Some Anglican writers have conceived the idea that the Roman Patriarchate extended only throughout Southern Italy, and did not include Gaul or even North Italy, in spite of the clear witness of Hosius at Nicæa.[3] Their
