Diocese of Fiesole

The diocese’s jurisdiction includes 218 parishes in the communes of Tuscany : in the provinces of Florence (southeast), Arezzo (northwest) and Siena (northeast).

The bishop's chair is located in the city of Fiesole in the church of St. Romulus .

All parishes are divided between 7 deans (Isole di Fiesole, Valdarno Fiorentino, Valdarno Aretino, Altipiano Valdarnesa, Val di Sieve, Chianti and Casentino). Part of the diocese is an exclave within the archdiocese of Florence.

According to legend, the first bishop of Fiesole was Saint Romulus, who was sent to preach the Gospel in Tuscany by the Apostle Peter , whose pupil he was. Saint Romulus suffered a martyr's death in Fieole in the year 67 .

Some researchers believe that the department in Fiesole was founded in the III or V century , as evidenced by the surviving documents confirming the presence of the bishop in the city. The first bishop of this time known by name was also called Romulus. He was elected as a bishop as a result of two letters addressed by Saint Ambrose to local Christians.

Pope Gelasius I, in his epistle to Elpidio, the Bishop of Volterra , speaks of another, unknown by name, Bishop Fiesole. In 536, Rustico, a representative of Pope Agapit I at the II Constantinople Ecumenical Council , occupied the department of Fiesole.

On February 15, 556, Pope Pelagius I in one of the documents speaks of the seven bishops of Tuscany, without naming them by name, including Bishop Fiesole. After the conquest of the Langobards , professing Arianism , many churches in the city were destroyed, the priests were persecuted and hid in neighboring dioceses. The faculty of Fiesole remained widowed for decades. In 599, Pope Gregory I ordered Venantio, Bishop Looney, to restore the destroyed diocese.

Only 150 years later, the name of Bishop Fiesole, Teobaldo, was mentioned in the documents again. On July 5, 715, in the presence of the bishops of Florence , Pisa, and Lucca, in the church of St. Genesis in the ancient village of Vikus Uvalari (now Vallari) near San Miniato , he delivered a speech. Theobaldo took the side of Arezzo, in a dispute between the dioceses of Arezzo and Siena .

At the end of the rule of the Lombards in Italy, the diocese of Fiesole was under the control of the bishop-count. According to written sources, the first bishop, a vassal of the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire , was Holy Leto, who occupied the pulpit of Fiesole in the 9th century .

The territory of the diocese at that time extended mainly in the mountainous and hilly areas under the control of the local feudal lords . Three influential feudal families of Florence - Guidi, Ricasoli and Ubertini owned estates on the territory of Fiesole. Local feudal lords did not want to recognize the superiority of the bishop.

The successor of Saint Leto, the bishop of Saint Alessandro, trying to regain control of the rebellious vassals and the lands that they seized from the diocese, in 823 went to Pavia an audience with the emperor Lothar I. He received an imperial decree, in which Fiesole was ordered to obey the bishop, but on his way back the assassin was attacked by the murderers near Bologna and drowned in the river. He was canonized by the church. The relics of the holy bishop rest in the basilica of St. Alexander.

Following him, another future holy bishop ascended the pulpit of Fiesole, his name was Romano. He defended the interests of the church from the encroachments of secular authorities and resisted the Norman conquest. For this, the bishop was killed by the Normans, who also burned the cathedral. During the fire, the diocesan archive also burned down. An abbey was later established on the site of the burned temple.

All three holy bishops remained in the memory of the people, as fair judges and advocates of the poor. At a time when there were constant wars and clashes between feudal lords, not to mention invasion from the outside, ordinary people suffered most of all, Bishop Fiesole was the only one who resisted robbery and murder, including at the expense of diocesan incomes and privileges. The acts of the bishops deserved recognition from the locals, who, even before the official canonization, revered as saints these three prelates .

The secular power of Bishop Fiesole over the territory of the diocese was recognized throughout the Middle Ages, during the Medici rule until the end of the 18th century , when administrative reform in Tuscany deprived it of secular jurisdiction .

After the invasion of the Normans , Bishop Saint Donat, a native of Ireland , took up the restoration of the diocese in 829 , participating in 826 at the Cathedral in Rome under Pope Eugenius II . He became the last bishop elected by the local flock. After him, the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, the former and the kings of Italy, or those to whom they granted this privilege, appointed Bishops of Fiesole. This state of affairs often promoted simony.

Under Bishop Jacopo Bavaro, who was placed on the pulpit by Emperor Henry II , the Diocese of Fiesole experienced a genuine revival with the construction of a new cathedral in 1028 . On the ruins of the cathedral, destroyed by the Normans two centuries before, began the construction of the abbey of St. Bartholomew , better known as Badia Fiesolana. He also erected a bishop's palace and was given a blessing to Saint Giovanni Gualberto to establish the order of valombrosian.

The Diocesan Seminary was founded on May 8, 1575 under the bishop Francesco Cattani da DiCceto. At first it was located in Ponterosso, from where it was transferred to Fiesole, in a building built under the bishop Lorenzo della Robbia in 1635 .

At the end of 2006, out of 140,900 people living in the territory of the diocese, 138,900 were Catholics, which corresponds to 98.6% of the total population of the diocese.

• Annuario pontificio for 2007 and previous years on the site [1] , page [2]
• The official website of the diocese
• Pius Bonifacius Gams, Series episcoporum Ecclesiae Catholicae , Leipzig 1931, pp. 749-750 (lat.)
• Konrad Eubel, Hierarchia Catholica Medii Aevi , vol. 1 , pp. 248–249; vol. 2 , pp. XXIV, 154; vol. 3 , p. 196; vol. 4 , p. 187 (lat.)
• Gaetano Moroni, Dizionario di erudizione storico-ecclesiastica , vol. XXIV, Venezia 1844, pp. 255–261
• Biography of Antonio Caetani (eng.)
• Francesco Caetani Biography
• Bruna Bocchini Camaiani, I vescovi toscani nel periodo lorenese
• Per l'episcopato di Guglielmo Foschi: Ida Giovanna Rao, Paolo Viti, Raffaella Maria Zaccaria, I processi di Girolamo Savonarola: 1498 , Firenze 2001, p. 140, ISBN 88-8450-092-3
• Borders of the Diocese at gcatholic.org
• Indirizzo al Consiglio Generale della Toscana a nome della popolazione di Fiesole la ottenere la permanente dimora del proprio cesta di quella città , a cura di M. Bagni, Firenze, Tipografia Campolmi, 1848.
• Robert Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze , Firenze, Sansoni, 1956
• Giuseppe Raspini, L'Archivio Capitolare di Fiesole , Roma, Ist. Polig. dello Stato, 1960
• Giuseppe Raspini, L'archivio vescovile di Fiesole , Roma, 1962
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli archivi parrocchiali della diocesi di Fiesole , Rome , Il centro di ricerca editore, 1974
• Giuseppe Raspini, Dora Liscia, L'origine della Diocesi fiesolana e alcuni suoi tesori di oreficeria , Fiesole, Comune di Fiesole, 1977
• Giuseppe Raspini, Le visite pastorali della diocesi di Fiesole , Città del Vaticano, 1979-80
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli Eremi nella Diocesi di Fiesole , Fiesole, Alberto Sbolci, 1981
• Giuseppe Raspini, Il movimento eremitico, monastico, conventuale e religioso nella diocesi di Fiesole , Fiesole, A.Sbolci, 1981
• Giuseppe Raspini, I rumori nella diocesi di Fiesole , Sl, sn, 1981
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli istituti religiosi nella Diocesi di Fiesole , Sl, sn, 1982
• Giuseppe Raspini, I Conventi nella diocesi di Fiesole , Sl, sn, 1982
• Giuseppe Raspini, I monasteri nella Diocesi di Fiesole , Fiesole, A. Sbolci, 1982
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli archivi delle corporazioni religiose soppresse della diocesi di Fiesole , Sl, sn, 1983
• AA.VV., Fiesole una Diocesi nella storia: saggi, contributi, immagini , Firenze, Servizio editoriale fiesolano Corradino Mori, 1986
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli archivi ecclesiastici della Diocesi di Fiesole. Riordinamento e inventari , Roma, Città del Vaticano, 1987-1988
• Giuseppe Raspini, La contea di Fiesole , Fiesole, 1989
• Giuseppe Raspini, Il Vescovo Camilli e il movimento cattolico a Fiesole (1893-1909) , Fiesole, Servizio Editoriale Fiesolano, 1991
• Giuseppe Raspini, La Chiesa Fiesolana e le sue istituzioni , Fiesole, Servizio Editoriale Fiesolano, 1993
• Maura Borgioli, Un archivio, una Diocesi. Fiesole nel Medioevo e nell'età moderna . Firenze, Leo S.Olschki, 1995
• Mélanges de l'Ecole française de Rome , a cura di École française de Rome, v.108 no.1-1996, Roma, L'Ecole, 1996
• Giuseppe Raspini, San Romolo vescovo di Fiesole , Firenze, G. Pagnini, 1997
• Nicolangelo D'Acunto, Papato e monachesimo esente nei secoli centrali del Medioevo , Firenze, Firenze University Press, 2002
• Giuseppe Raspini, Gli archivi ecclesiastici della diocesi di Fiesole , Firenze, G. Pagnini, 2006
• Maria Elena Cortese, Signori, castelli, città: l'aristocrazia del territorio fiorentino tra X e XII secolo , Firenze, LS Olschki, 2007

• Cathedral of Saint Romulus (Fiesole)