Eborius or Eburius ( fl. 314) is the first bishop of Eboracum (the later

York York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...

) known by name.

Biography

Eborius is only mentioned as one of the three bishops from

Roman Britain Roman Britain was the period in classical antiquity when large parts of the island of Great Britain were under occupation by the Roman Empire. The occupation lasted from AD 43 to AD 410. During that time, the territory conquered wa ...

attending the Council of Arles in 314. That council was convoked by

Constantine the Great Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to convert to Christianity. Born in Naissus, Dacia Mediterran ...

with the special object of settling the question of the Bishopric of Carthage, disputed between

Cyprian Cyprian (; la, Thaschus Caecilius Cyprianus; 210 – 14 September 258 AD''The Liturgy of the Hours according to the Roman Rite: Vol. IV.'' New York: Catholic Book Publishing Company, 1975. p. 1406.) was a bishop of Carthage and an early Christ ...

and Donatus. Among the bishops from ‘the Gauls’ present at the council was ‘Eborius episcopus de civitate Eboracensi, provincia Britanniæ.’ Although suspicious, the similarity between the names ''Eborius'' and ''Eboracum'' can be explained if the bishop's actual name was Ivor, a common Welsh name which can easily be Latinised into ''Eborius''. The other two British bishops at Arles were ‘

Restitutus Restitutus () was a Romano-British bishop, probably from Londinium (London), one of the British delegation who attended the church synod or Council held at Arles (Arelate), in Gaul, in AD 314. The list of those who signed the ''Acta'', the decis ...

, episcopus de civitate Londinensi’ (

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

) and ‘

Adelfius Adelfius () was a Romano-British bishop, possibly from Londinium (London), Lindum (Lincoln), Camulodunum (Colchester) or Legionensium (Caerleon), who was part of the British delegation who attended the Council of Arles (314), church council held ...

episcopus de civitate colonia Londinensium.’ The latter name has variously been read as ''

Lindum Lindum Colonia was the Latin name for the settlement which is now the City of Lincoln in Lincolnshire. It was founded as a Roman Legionary Fortress during the reign of the Emperor Nero (58–68 AD) or possibly later. Evidence from Roman tomb ...

'' (

Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincol ...

) or ''

Camulodunum Camulodunum (; la, ), the Ancient Roman name for what is now Colchester in Essex, was an important castrum and city in Roman Britain, and the first capital of the province. A temporary "strapline" in the 1960s identifying it as the "oldest re ...

'' (

Colchester Colchester ( ) is a city in Essex, in the East of England. It had a population of 122,000 in 2011. The demonym is Colcestrian. Colchester occupies the site of Camulodunum, the first major city in Roman Britain and its first capital. Colch ...

). A

presbyter Presbyter () is an honorific title for Christian clergy. The word derives from the Greek ''presbyteros,'' which means elder or senior, although many in the Christian antiquity would understand ''presbyteros'' to refer to the bishop functioning a ...

and a

deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian churches, such as the Catholic Chur ...

, ‘Sacerdos presbyter’ and ‘Arminius diaconus,’ also attended the council with Adelfius, which suggests, according to W.H.C. Frend, that he held seniority among the three bishops. Jeremy Knight states that the bishops all represented different provinces of Roman Britain, and thus the priest and deacon may have been at Arles to represent Britannia Prima. The mention of these names is the most definite piece of evidence of the existence of an organised Christian church in the Roman province of Britain, and of its close dependence on the church of Gaul. It is worth noting that among the canons they subscribed was one fixing a single day for the celebration of Easter throughout the world. So that the different custom of the British church on that question had not yet arisen. The above facts are in Labbe's ‘Concilia’ from a Corvey MS., and Isidorus Mercator's list substantially agrees in including ‘Eburius,’ though it describes him only as ‘ex provincia Britanniæ’. The passage is wrongly punctuated in Migne's edition; but in Crabbe the reading is ‘ex provincia Bizacena, civitate Tubernicensi, Eburius episcopus.’ Tillemont conjecturally identifies Eborius with the Hibernius who joins in a synodal letter to

Pope Sylvester I Pope Sylvester I (also Silvester, 285 – 31 December 335) was the bishop of Rome from 31 January 314 until his death. He filled the see of Rome at an important era in the history of the Western Church, yet very little is known of him. The acco ...

, but this seems quite arbitrary.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Eborius 3rd-century births 4th-century deaths 4th-century Romano-British bishops People from York Bishops of York

Biography

See also

References