Diocese of Armenia was an

East Syriac The East Syriac Rite or East Syrian Rite, also called the Edessan Rite, Assyrian Rite, Persian Rite, Chaldean Rite, Nestorian Rite, Babylonian Rite or Syro-Oriental Rite, is an Eastern Christian liturgical rite that employs the Divine Liturgy ...

diocese (and briefly a

metropolitan province An ecclesiastical province is one of the basic forms of jurisdiction in Christian Churches with traditional hierarchical structure, including Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity. In general, an ecclesiastical province consists of sever ...

) of the Church of the East between the fifth and fourteenth centuries. The diocese served members of the Church of the East in

Armenia Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ' ...

, and its bishops sat at Halat. The diocese is last mentioned in 1281, and probably lapsed in the fourteenth century during the disorders that attended the fragmentation of the Mongol empire.

Background

The East Syriac diocese of Armenia, whose bishops sat in the town of Halat on the northern shore of Lake Van, is attested between the fifth and fourteenth centuries. In the fifth century the diocese of Halat was not assigned to a metropolitan province, but was later included in the province of

Nisibis Nusaybin (; '; ar, نُصَيْبِيْن, translit=Nuṣaybīn; syr, ܢܨܝܒܝܢ, translit=Nṣībīn), historically known as Nisibis () or Nesbin, is a city in Mardin Province, Turkey. The population of the city is 83,832 as of 2009 and is ...

, probably shortly after the

Arab conquest of Persia The Muslim conquest of Persia, also known as the Arab conquest of Iran, was carried out by the Rashidun Caliphate from 633 to 654 AD and led to the fall of the Sasanian Empire as well as the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion. Th ...

. The patriarch

Timothy I Timothy I may refer to: * Pope Timothy I of Alexandria, Pope of Alexandria & Patriarch of the See of St. Mark in 378–384 * Timothy I of Constantinople Timothy I or Timotheus I (? – 1 April 518) was a Christian priest who was appointed Patria ...

created a short-lived metropolitan province for Armenia, presumably by raising the status of the diocese of Halat. By the second half of the eleventh century Halat was once again a suffragan diocese of the province of Nisibis. By the thirteenth century the jurisdiction of the bishops of Halat included the towns of Van and Wastan. The thirteenth-century Nestorian metropolitan Shlemun of Basra, author of the ''Book of the Bee'' (''c.''1222), was a native of Halat.

Bishops of Armenia

The bishop Artashahr of Armenia was among the signatories of the acts of the synod of Dadisho in 424. At this period the diocese, probably based on Halat, was not assigned to a metropolitan province. The bishop Yaqob of Halat, a writer mentioned in the list of Syriac authors compiled in the fourteenth century by Abdisho Bar Brikha, flourished during the reign of the patriarch

Pethion Pethion was Patriarch of the Church of the East from 731 to 740. Sources Brief accounts of Pethion's patriarchate are given in the ''Ecclesiastical Chronicle'' of the Jacobite writer Bar Hebraeus (''floruit'' 1280) and in the ecclesiastical hist ...

(731–40). An unnamed bishop of Armenia was present at the consecration of the patriarch Abdisho II in 1074. A note of 1137 by the copyist of the ''Mukhtasar'' mentions the recent suppression of the metropolitan province of Bardaa (in Azerbaijan) and the attribution of responsibility for the remaining Christians in the province to Eliya, bishop of Halat. The bishop Yuwanis of Halat was appointed metropolitan of Kashgar and Nevaketh by the patriarch Eliya III (1176–90). The bishop Sliba-zkha of Halat was present at the consecration of the patriarch

Denha I Mar Denha I (also written Dinkha I) was Patriarch of the Church of the East (sometimes referred to as the Nestorian church) from 1265 to 1281. He was widely suspected of murdering Shem'on Bar Qaligh, bishop of Tus, and was remembered by later ...

in 1265. The bishop Hnanisho of Halat was present at the consecration of the patriarch

Yahballaha III Yahballaha III ( 1245–13 November 1317), known in earlier years as Rabban Marcos (or Markos) or Yahballaha V, was Patriarch of the East from 1281 to 1317. As patriarch, Yahballaha headed the Church of the East during the severe persecu ...

in 1281.Sliba, 124 (Arabic)

Notes

References

* * Fiey, J. M., ''Assyrie chrétienne'' (3 vols, Beirut, 1962) * * * * Gismondi, H., ''Maris, Amri, et Salibae: De Patriarchis Nestorianorum Commentaria I: Amri et Salibae Textus'' (Rome, 1896) * Gismondi, H., ''Maris, Amri, et Salibae: De Patriarchis Nestorianorum Commentaria II: Maris textus arabicus et versio Latina'' (Rome, 1899) * Wallis Budge, E. A., ''The Book of the Bee'' (Oxford, 1896) * * {{Dioceses of the Church of the East Dioceses of the Church of the East Dioceses of the Assyrian Church of the East Assyrian geography Christian organizations established in the 5th century Eastern Christianity in Turkey