Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 13.djvu/812

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

SEVILLE


744


SEVILLE


1676, 1677, and 16S0), and three times her mother went to visit her in the south (1672, 1690, and 1694). From this last visit she was not to return. Stricken at the bedside of her sick daughter — although this was disputed at the end of the nineteenth century — she died at Grignan at the age of seventy.

As soon as she became a widow Mme de Sevigne, without favouring them, found numerous aspirants to her hand, among them Turenne, the Prince de Conti, and her cousin, Bussy-Rabutin. She lived mostlv at court, visiting her friends Mme de La Faj-ette, Mme de Larochefoucauld, Mme de Pom- ponne etc. As early as 1677 she went to reside at the Hotel Carnavalet, of which she remained the lessee until her death, but she often stayed at Livry (Seine et Oise) or at the ChAteau des Rochers (Ille-et-Vilaine < . But wherever she was, tlv memory of her daughter was with her. Her maternal love is unparalleled. Arnaud d'Andilly reproaches the Marchioness with loving "as a lovely pagan" her whom Bussy-Rabutin calls "the prettiest girl in France". As a matter of fact this absorbing and somewhat impassioned affection caused her much suffering owanp to the enforced separations, but unhke vulgar passions, it was never egotistical. Naturally it in- spired the correspondence of tho Marchioness, but this corre- spondence is also a picture of the lovely period at which it was written, or rather it is an eloquent echo of what was said and thouglit at the court and in the distinguishe< 1 world frequented by its author. Her style is marked by natural- ne.ss, movement, and humour, dis- playing a constant creation of words, not with regard to new terms, but the placing of the old, and the uses tu wlmli they were put. The author manifests her gaiety, her natural disposition to look on the best side of things, while her irony and wit, though sometimes light, are always healthy. Exuberant and independent in speech, Mme de Sevigne was always dignified in conduct, with serious tastes beneath her worldly manner. Sincerely religious, she had a special devo- tion to Divine Providence. She displayed this devo- tion to her la.st hour in a manner which impres.sed the Count de Grignan. "She faced death", he says, "with astonishing firmness and submission".

Georges Bertrin.

Seville, Archdiocese of (Hispalensis), in Spain, is bounded on the north by Badajoz; on the east by Cordova and Malaga, on the south by Cadiz, on the west by Portugal. It comprises portions of the civil provinces of Seville, Cadiz, Cordova, Iluelva, and Malaga. Its episcopal city has a population of some 144,(K)0. Its suffragans are Badajoz, Ca<liz and C<'Uta, the Canaries, Cordova, and ^rcneriffe.

In Roman times Seville was the capital of the Prov- ince of Bajtica, and the origin of the diocese goes back to Apostohc times, or at least to the first century of our era. St. Gerontius, Bishop of Italica (about i^our miles from Hispalis or Seville), preached in Bietica in Apostolic times, and without doubt must have left a pastor of its own to Seville. It is certain that in 303, when Sts. Justa and Rufina, the potters, suffered martyrdom for refusing to adore the idol Salambo


logue of the ancient prelates of Seville preserved in the "Codex Emilianensis", a manuscript of the year 1000, now in the Escorial. When Constantine brought peace to the Church Evodius was Bishop of Seville; he set himself to rebuild the ruined churches, among them he appears to have built the church of San Vicente, perhaps the first cathedral of Seville. In the time of Bishoj) Sempronius Seville was con- sidered the metropolis of Ba'tica; and Glaucius was bi.shop when the barbarians invaded Spain. Mar- cianus was bishoj) in 428, when Gunderic wished to seize the treasures of the Church of San Vicente; Sabinus II was dispossessed of his see by Rechila the Suevian (441) and recovered it in 461. Zeno (472-486) was appointed vicar Apostolic by Pope Simplicius, and Pope Hormisdas gave the same chaige to Bishop Sallustius (510-22) in the provinces of Baetica and Lusitania. But the see was rendered illustrious above all by the holy brothers Sts. Leander and Isidore. The former of these contributed to the conversion of St. Hermengild and Recared, and presided at the Third Council of Toledo (.589), while the latter presided at the Fourth Coun- cil of Toledo and was the teacher of medieval Sjmin. A very different kind of celebrity was attained by Archbishop Oppas, who usurped the See of Toledo and conspired with his nephews, the sons of "\^ itiza, against Don Rodrigo, contributing bj' his treason to the disaster of Guadalete and the downfall of the Visigothic power. During that period two provincial councils of Ba'tica were held at Seville: the first, in the reign of Recared, in 590, assembled in the cathedral to urge the execution of the mandates of the Third Council of luledu; the .second, in November, 690, in the reign of Sisebut, was convoked and presided over by St. Isidore, to promote ecclesiastical discipUne. The succession of the bishops of Seville continued after the Mohammedan conquest, Nonnitus being elected on the death of Oppas. The last Mozarabic bLshop was Clement, elected two years before the in- vasion of the Almohades (1144). The Catholic reli- gion was confined to the parish Church of S. lld(»- fonso, until the restoration following the reconquest of the city by St . I'crdinand. After a siege of fifteen months, the holy king look the city on 23 Nov., 1248; and the Bi.shop of Cordova, Gutierre de Olea, purified the great mosque and prepared it for Divine worship on 22 December. The king deposited in the new cathedral two famous images of the Bles.sed Virgin: "Our Lady of the Kings", an ivory statue to which a miraculous origin was attributed, and which St. Fer- dinand always carried with him in battle on his saddle- bow; and the silver image, "Our Lady of the See". The king's .son Philip was ajjpoinfcd Archbishop of Seville, whilc he was given as coadjulor the Dominican liainmiido de Losada, Bisliop of Segovia, who became arclibishoj) five years later, on the abdication of the infanta. In addition to the catlKHhaJ eliai)ter, another community of clerics was formed to sing the Divine Office in the Chapel Royal of Our Lady of the Kings (Nuestra Senora de los Reyes) about 1252. Most of the other mosques of the city were converted into churches, only St a. Maria la Blanca, St a. Cruz, and S. Bartolom6 being left to the Jews for synagogues. The


there was a Bishop of Seville, Sabinus, who assistea cathedral originated in the great mosque which was at the Ojuncil of Ilibcris (287). Before that time the work of the emirs who built the Aljama mosque, Marcellus had been bishop, as appears from a cata- rebuilt in 1171 by the Ahnohadcmir, Yusuf-ben-