Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallipoli

The Diocese of Gallipoli (Latin: Dioecesis Gallipolitana) was a Roman Catholic ecclesiastical territory in the province of Apulia in southern Italy.

[1][2] In the Synecdemus of Hierocles of the time of the Emperor Justinian (527–565), Gallipoli is listed as a suffragan bishopric of the metropolitan of Sancta Severina.

[6] When the Lombards were driven out in the Byzantine reconquest of southern Italy, the Church of Gallipoli returned to its obedience to the Greek Metropolitan of Santa Severina.

[9] The Liber Censuum of the Roman Church, which was compiled beginning in 1192, includes the diocese of Gallipoli as a suffragan of the archdiocese of Otranto.

The city of Gallipoli was completely destroyed by Charles of Anjou, King of Naples (1266–1285), and for a considerable time remained desolate.

In these transactions, Gallipoli lost the towns of Copertino, Galatone, Secli, Nohe, Neviano, Tuglie, Parabita, Alliste, Felline, Taviano, and Casarano, and its bishops had to spend the rest of the century defending their episcopal mensa ('property').

His successor Bishop Alfonso Spinelli obtained from King Ferdinand I the grant of a fifteenth of all the money paid into the royal customs collection agency (dogana) in Gallipoli.

[14] On 26 December 1805, Napoleon I, King of Italy, and Emperor of the French, declared Ferdinand IV deposed, and replaced him with his own brother Joseph Bonaparte on 30 March 1806.

[16] By a law of 13 February 1807, all of the houses of Benedictines or Cistercians were suppressed, and their property confiscated by the State, to be used for pensions to subsidize the transition of the monks to the condition of being secular priests.

Property which had belonged to the suppressed Society of Jesus was confiscated, sold, and the money applied to the Monti di pietà.

[18] The current cathedral was begun in 1629 by Bishop Consalvo de Rueda, with money supplied by the testament of the Chief Physician of Sicily, Giovanni Giacomo Lazari, a native of Gallipoli.

[23] Under the Roman rite, introduced by Bishop Alessio Zelodano in 1513,[24] the Chapter received an additional four Canons, making a corporation of eighteen members.

[29] On 18 February 1984, the Vatican and the Italian State signed a new and revised concordat, which was accompanied in the next year by enabling legislation.