Latin Patriarchate of Constantinople

The Latin Patriarch of Constantinople was an office established as a result of Crusader activity in the Near East and based in Rome at the St. Peter's Basilica. The title should not be confused with that of the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople, an office which existed before and after.

Before the East–West Schism in 1054, the Christian Church within the borders of the ancient Roman Empire was effectively ruled by five patriarchs (the "Pentarchy"): In descending order of precedence: Rome by the Bishop of Rome (who rarely used the title "Patriarch") and those of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

In the West the Bishop of Rome was recognized as having superiority over the other Patriarchs, while in the East, the Patriarch of Constantinople gradually came to occupy a leading position. In the East the Pope was generally considered first among equals, but not a direct superior. The sees of Rome and Constantinople were often at odds with one another, just as the Greek and Latin Churches as a whole were often at odds both politically and in things ecclesiastical. There were complex cultural currents underlying these difficulties, including the fact that in the West feudal models began to influence the way of viewing relations within the Church. The tensions led in 1054 to a serious rupture between the Greek East and Latin West called the East–West Schism, which while not in many places absolute, still dominates the ecclesiastical landscape.

In 1204, the Fourth Crusade invaded, seized and sacked Constantinople, and established the Latin Empire. This was not the doing of the Bishop of Rome, the Pope. Initially he spoke out against the fourth crusade. In writing to his legate the pope said, in part "How, indeed, is the Greek church to be brought back into ecclesiastical union and to a devotion for the Apostolic See when she has been beset with so many afflictions and persecutions that she sees in the Latins only an example of perdition and the works of darkness, so that she now, and with reason, detests the Latins more than dogs?"

However the popes accepted the acts of the accompanying Latin clergy who set up a Latin Patriarchate subservient in the Western manner to the Pope. The pope recognised these "Latin" sees at the Fourth Council of the Lateran. Furthermore, those Orthodox bishops left in their place were made to swear an oath of allegiance to the pope.

When the last Latin emperor Baldwin II fled from Constantinople he was well received in Rome by Pope Urban IV who promised him support to regain the throne. This threat of continued support prompted the new Greek emperor to seek out a reunion. Understanding the situation of 1204 helps with the context of the reunion council.

By establishing communion with the Latin Patriarchs the Papacy in effect made official their position within the Roman Catholic Church. This act was part of a more general picture in which the Crusaders on the one hand established Latin Kingdoms officially acknowledged by the Roman Catholic Church, in the Middle East and in Greece and the Greek Islands, and also in parts of the Balkans. Included were a similar array of Latin episcopal sees.

However, the Latin Empire in Constantinople was eventually defeated and dispossessed by a resurgent Byzantium in 1261, and yet the Latin Patriarchate persisted as a titular office with varying vigour.

On 8 February 1314, Pope Clement V united the Patriarchate with the episcopal see of Negroponte (Chalcis), hitherto a suffragan of the Latin Archbishopric of Athens, so that the patriarchs could once more have a territorial diocese on Greek soil and exercise a direct role as the head of the Latin clergy in what remained of Latin Greece.

For a time, like many ecclesiastical offices in the West, it had rival contenders who were supporters or protégés of the rival popes. As to the title Latin Patriarch of Constantinople, this was the case at least from 1378 to 1423. Thereafter the office continued as an honorific title, during the later centuries attributed to a leading clergyman in Rome, until it ceased to be assigned after 1948 and was finally abolished in 1964.

A Vicariate Apostolic of Istanbul (until 1990, Constantinople) has existed from 1742 into the present day.

List of Latin Patriarchs of Constantinople

 * Tommaso Morosini (1204–1211)
 * vacant (1211–1215)
 * Gervasio (1215–1219)
 * vacant (1219–1221)
 * Matteo (1221–1226)
 * Jean Halgrin (1226), declined office
 * Simone (1227–1233)
 * vacant (1233–1234)
 * Niccolò Visconti da Castro Arquato (1234–1251)
 * vacant (1251–1253)
 * Pantaleon Giustiniani (1253–1278); From 1261, Patriarchate titular only
 * Girolamo Masci, O.F.M. (1278–1288), later Pope Nicholas IV
 * Pietro Correr (1288–1302)
 * Leonardo Faliero (1302–c. 1305)
 * Nicholas of Thebes (c. 1308–c. 1335), later cardinal (1332–1335)
 * Gozzio Battaglia (1335–1339) (German Wikipedia article)
 * Rolando d'Asti (1339) (died immediately)
 * Enrico d'Asti (1339–1345), bishop of Negroponte
 * Stephen of Pinu (1346)
 * William (1346–1364)
 * St. Pierre Thomas (1364–1366)
 * Paul (1366–1370)
 * Ugolino Malabranca de Orvieto O.S.A. (1371–c. 1375), bishop of Rimini
 * Giacomo da Itri (1376–1378), archbishop of Otranto (Italian Wikipedia article)
 * Paul Palaiologos Tagaris (1379/80–1384)
 * vacant (1384–1390)
 * Angelo Correr (1390–1405), later Pope Gregory XII
 * Louis of Mytilene (Ludovico? Luiz?) (1406–1408)
 * Antonio Correr (1408)
 * Alfonso of Seville (1408)
 * Francesco Lando (1409), patriarch of Grado
 * Giovanni Contarini (1409–c. 1412)
 * Jean de la Rochetaillée (1412–1423)
 * Giovanni Contarini (1424–1430?), restored
 * François de Conzié (1430–1432)
 * vacant (1432–1438)
 * Francesco Condulmer (1438–1453)
 * Gregory Mammas (1453–1458), formerly Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople as Gregory III
 * Isidore of Kiev (1458–1462)
 * Basilios Bessarion (Ioannis Bessarion) (1463–1472)
 * Pietro Riario, O.F.M. (1472–1474)
 * Girolamo Lando (1474–c. 1496), Archbishop of Crete
 * Giovanni Michiel (1497–1503) Bishop of Verona, later Cardinal
 * Juan de Borja Lanzol de Romaní, el mayor (1503)
 * Francisco Lloris y de Borja (1503–1506)
 * Marco Cornaro (1506–1507)
 * Tamás Bakócz (1507–1521)
 * Marco Cornaro (1521–1524), restored
 * Giles of Viterbo, O.S.A. (1524–1530), Cardinal bishop of Viterbo
 * Francesco Pesaro (1530–1545) Archbishop of Zadar
 * Marino Grimani (1545–1546)
 * Ranuccio Farnese (1546–1550)
 * Fabio Colonna (bishop) (1550–1554), bishop of Aversa
 * Ranuccio Farnese (1554–1565) restored
 * Scipione Rebiba (1565–1573) Cardinal bishop of Albano
 * Prospero Rebiba (1573–1593) Bishop of Troia
 * Silvio Savelli (cardinal) (1594–1596)
 * Ercole Tassoni (1596–1597)
 * Bonifazio Bevilacqua Aldobrandini (1598–1627?)
 * Bonaventura Secusio, O.F.M. Obs. (1599–1618)
 * Ascanio Gesualdo (1618–1638)
 * Francesco Maria Macchiavelli (1640–1641)
 * Giovanni Giacomo Panciroli (1641–1643)
 * Giovanni Battista Spada (1643–1675?)
 * Volumnio Bandinelli (1658–1660), later Cardinal
 * Stefano Ugolini (1667–1681)
 * Odoardo Cibo (Cybo) (1689–1706?), titular archbishop of Seleucia in Isauria
 * Luigi Pico della Mirandola (1706–1712)
 * Andrea Rigio (1716–1717)
 * Camillo Cibo (Cybo) (1718–1729)
 * Mondillo Orsini, C.O. (1729–1751)
 * Ferdinando Maria de Rossi (1751–1759)
 * Filippo Caucci (1760–1771)
 * Juan Portugal de la Puebla (1771–1781), later cardinal
 * Francesco Antonio Marcucci (1781–1798)
 * Benedetto Fenaja, C.M. (1805–1823)
 * Giuseppe della Porta Rodiani (1823–1835)
 * Giovanni Soglia Ceroni (1835–1839)
 * Antonio Maria Traversi (1839–1842)
 * Giovanni Giacomo Sinibaldi (1843)
 * Fabio Maria Asquini (1844–1845)
 * Giovanni Giuseppe Canali (1845–1851)
 * Domenico Lucciardi (1851–1860)
 * Giuseppe Melchiade Ferlisi (1860–1865)
 * Ruggero Luigi Emidio Antici Mattei (1866–1878)
 * Giacomo Gallo (1878–1881)
 * vacant (1881–1887)
 * Giulio Lenti (1887–1895)
 * Giovanni Battista Casali del Drago (1895–1899)
 * Alessandro Sanminiatelli Zabarella (1899–1901)
 * Carlo Nocella (1901–1903), died 1908, former Latin Patriarch of Antioch
 * Giuseppe Ceppetelli (1903–1917)
 * vacant (1917–1923)
 * Michele Zezza di Zapponeta (1923–1927)
 * Antonio Anastasio Rossi (1927–1948)
 * vacant (1948–1964)

This title was officially abolished in 1965.

Sources and external links

 * Giorgio Fedalto, La Chiesa latina in Oriente, Mazziana, Verona, 2nd ed. 1981, e vol.
 * List of Latin Patriarchs of Constantinople by GCatholic.org
 * Catholic Hierarchy
 * Catholic Hierarchy