A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

The patriarch of Toledo, in Spain.

The patriarch of York, in Britain.

The patriarch of Constantinople, styled the Œcumenical, or Universal Patriarch.

All these were independent of one another, till Rome by encroachment, and Constantinople by law, gained a superiority over some of the rest. The subordinate patriarchs, nevertheless, still retained the title of exarchs of the diocese, and continued to sit and vote in councils.

The title of patriarch is still kept up in the Greek Church; the supreme head of which is the patriarch of Constantinople, who pays a large sum (sometimes ten, sometimes twenty, thousand crowns) to the Grand Seignor, for his instalment. His revenue amounts to near forty thousand crowns a year, arising from the sale of bishoprics and other benefices; besides that every priest in Constantinople pays him a crown per annum. There are about 150 bishops and archbishops dependent on this patriarch.

After the patriarch of Constantinople, the richest is the patriarch of Jerusalem. The patriarch of Antioch is the poorest of them all. The patriarch of Alexandria is very powerful: he assumes the title of Grand Judge of the whole world. But what distinguishes him more than all the rest from the patriarch of Constantinople is, his being less exposed to the avarice and resentments of the Turks.

The patriarch of Constantinople is elected by the archbishops and bishops, with the consent and approbation of the Grand Seignor, who presents the new patriarch with a white horse, a black capuch, a crosier, and an embroidered caftan. The bishop of Heraclea, as chief archbishop, has a right to consecrate him. This prelate, dressed in pontifical robes, conducts the patriarch to his throne, and vests him with the cross, mitre, and other ornaments. He is attended to the church by some of the officers of the Porte, who read over his letters patent at the church door, with a strict charge to the people to own him as their head, to maintain him suitably to his dignity, and to pay his debts, under penalty of bastinado and confiscation of their effects.

The Jews had their patriarchs, who were governors set up upon the destruction of Jerusalem. One of these had his residence at Tiberias, and another at Babylon; who were the heads of the Jews dispersed throughout the Roman and Persian empires. They continued in great power and dignity till the latter end of the fourth century, about which time the order ceased.

PATRIMONY. A name anciently given to church estates, or revenues. Thus we find mentioned, in the letters of St. Gregory, not only the patrimony of the Roman Church, but those likewise of the Churches of Rimini, Milan, and Ravenna. This name, therefore, does not peculiarly signify any sovereign dominion or jurisdiction, belonging to the Roman Church, or the pope.

Churches, in cities whose inhabitants were but of modern subsistence, had no estates left to them out of their own district: but those in imperial cities, such as Rome, Ravenna, and Milan, where senators, and persons of the first rank, inhabited, were endowed with estates in divers parts of the world. St. Gregory mentions the patrimony of the Church of Ravenna in Sicily, and another of the Church of Milan in that kingdom. The Roman Church had patrimonies in France, Africa, Sicily, in the Cottian Alps, and in many other countries. The same St. Gregory had a lawsuit with the bishop of Ravenna for the patrimonies of the two Churches, which afterwards ended by agreement.