[5] Little trust can be placed in the authenticity of the list of the seventeen bishops who were predecessors of Chrestus, to whom the Emperor Constantine wrote a letter.

Bishop Stephen II (c. 768–787) was present at the Second Council of Nicaea,[8] and carried to Constantinople the relics of St. Lucy for safety against the Saracen incursions.

[11] After Syracuse fell to the Arabs in 878, Bishop Sophronius was thrown into prison at Palermo together with the monk Theodosius, where he died in a dungeon.

The Pope decided that the pallium, which the Archbishops of Siracusa had been accustomed to wear through the indulgence of the Holy See, should not be used by the bishop of Syracuse and his successors.

On 5 April 1778, they petitioned King Ferdinand to have the number of dioceses increased to solve the problem, and he graciously agreed to their supplication.

In 1806, the Pope and the Consistorial Congregation assigned the Archbishop of Palermo the task of carrying out the negotiations which would lead to a reordering of the dioceses of Sicily.

On 12 September 1816, however, Pope Pius VII proceeded to issue the instructions to detach the new diocese of Caltagirone from Syracuse, and the King followed with executorial letters on 8 April 1817.