Obba
Obba was a town in the Roman province of Africa and a Christian bishopric, a suffragan of Carthage (episcopal see), the Metropolitan see of the Northe African ecclesiastical province. It is also included in the Catholic Church's list of titular sees.[1]
Location
Obba was near Carthage,[2] in modern Tunisia, and is placed in the Roman province of Africa by the Annuario Pontificio. Sophrone Pétridès is a lone voice in placing it in the Roman province of Byzacena,[3] further south.
According to the Catholic Encyclopaedia, it is the modern Ebba. (Ebba?)
Pétridès says the town was situated on the highway from Carthage to Theveste (modern Tebessa), seven miles from Lares (now Lorbeus) and sixteen miles from Altiburus (Henshir Medina).
Werner Huß sees as the most likely location modern Henchir Bou Djaoua or Henchir Merkeb en-Nabi.[4]
History
Polybius mentions the town, under the name of Abba, as the place Syphax retreated to after Massinissa and the Romans burned his camp near Utica,[5] and Titus Livius mentions it as where Syphax linked up with a body of 4000 Celtiberian mercenaries raised by Hasdrubal.[6]
Former Bishopric
A diocese was established there around 200 AD and suppressed around 600 AD. Three bishops are known:
- Paul, present at the Council of Carthage in 225, probably the Paul mentioned in the Martyrology for 19 January
- Felicissimus, a Donatist, present at the conference at Carthage in 411
- Valerianus, at the Second Council of Constantinople in 553.[3]
Titular see
The diocese was nominally restored as a Latin titular see circa 1890 and had many incumbents, albeit with some intervals, of the lowest (episcopal) rank (with a single archiepiscopal exception), both secular and regular :
- Bishop François-Xavier Corbet, Spiritans (C.S.Sp.) (1898.07.05 – 1914.07.25)
- Léon-Charles-Joseph Girod, C.S.Sp. (1915.01.13 – 1919.12.13)
- Domenico Comin, Salesians (S.D.B.) (1920.03.05 – 1963.08.17)
- Joseph Khiamsun Nittayo (later Archbishop) (1963.09.13 – 1965.12.18)
- Jaime Lachica Sin (later Cardinal) (1967.02.10 – 1972.01.15)
- Erwin Hecht, Missionary Oblates (O.M.I.) (1972.02.03 – 1974.07.01)
- Alberto Giraldo Jaramillo, Sulpicians (P.S.S.) (later Archbishop) (1974.08.08 – 1977.04.26)
- Protacio Guevarra Gungon (1977.07.08 – 1983.01.24)
- George Patrick Ziemann (1986.12.23 – 1992.07.14)
- José Eduardo Velásquez Tarazona (1994.03.15 – 2000.07.01)
- Gustavo Rodriguez Vega (later Archbishop) (2001.06.27 – 2008.10.08)
- Archbishop Joseph William Tobin, Redemptorists (C.SS.R.) (2010.08.02 – 2012.10.18)
- Rafał Markowski (2013.11.04 – ...), Auxiliary Bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Warszawa
References
- ↑ Annuario Pontificio 2013 (Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2013, ISBN 978-88-209-9070-1), p. 943
- ↑ Lewis and Short: "Obba"
- 1 2 Sophrone Pétridès, "Obba" in Catholic Encyclopedia (New York 1911)
- ↑ Werner Huß (Bamberg), "Abba" in Brill's New Pauly
- ↑ Polybius, Histories, 14,6,12; 7,5
- ↑ Livy, The History of Rome, 30.7