Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)/Ruspe

Titular see of Byzacena in Africa, mentioned only by Ptolemy (IV, 3) and the "Tabula" Peutinger. According to the first it was on the coast between Acholla (Kasr el Abiah) and Usilla (Henshir Inshilla); the "Tabula", or map of Peutinger, states that it was six (doubtless twenty-six) miles from the latter place. It is identified with the ruins called Ksour Siad, seventeen miles from Acholla. Others believe it to be at Henshir Sbia, four miles west of Cape Kapoudia (north of the Gulf of Gabes, Tunisia), its name being preserved at Koudiat Rosfa near Ras el Louza. It seems more probable that Koudiat Rospa is itself the ancient Ruspe. Four bishops of the see are known: Stephanus, exiled by King Huneric (484); St. Fulgentius, consecrated in 508, died in 533; Felicianus, his companion in exile and successor, who assisted at the Council of Carthage (about 534); Julianus, who signed in 641 the Anti-Monothelite letter of the bishops of Byzancena to the Emperor Constantine.

SMITH, Dict. of Greek and Roman geogr., s. v.; MULLER, Notes on Ptolemy, ed. DIDOT, I, 622; TOULOTTE, Geographie de l'Afrique chretienne: Byzacene et Tripolitaine (Montreuil, 1894), 164-6.

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