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 MOSTAR

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MOSTAR

standing. It was once a busy and prospfirous town, trading in woollen goods and morocco leather, but during the nineteenth century, owing to lack of com- munications with the outside world and also to the opening of the Suez canal which changed the caravan route, it has decayed. At the present time it is the capital of a vilayet and has 70,000 inhabitants. Its girdle of wall more than six miles in circumference, has become too large for it. The town has sulphur springs and many very fine mosques and churches. Among its more famous citizens were Baha ed-Din, Ibn el-Athir, and Ibn Khallikan, Mussulmans; Thomas of Marga, Isaac of Nineveh, Hanna of Adia- bene, etc. Christians.

In 410, at the council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, the Metropolitan of Adiabene had the united titles of Ar- bela, Hazza, Assyria, and Mossul (Chabot, "Synodi- con orientale", 265, 619). This is the earliest men- tion of the See of Mossul. It continued under the same style up to the seventh century. Soon after the Arab invasion the title of Adiabene was replaced by that of Assyria and Mossul. Le Quien (Oriens christ., II, 1215-1220) gives a long list of titulars from the seventh to the sixteenth century. Many of the Nes- torian patriarchs of Mossul became converts and re- sided there, beginning with Elias Denham in 1751. As there was already a Catholic Chaldean patriarch at Diarbekir, Rome in 1828 and especially in 1830 brought about the union of the two Churches and Mar Elias, also known as John VIII, was recognized as the only patriarch. He transferred the residence of the see to Bagdad, and since that time the Chaldean patri- archs have again taken up their residence at Mossul. The Chaldean archdiocese numbers 20,000 souls; 45 secular priests; 12 parishes; and 13 churches. In the neighbourhood of Alkosh is the convent of Rabban Hormuz, the home of the Antonian Congregation of St. Hormisdas of the Chaldean rite, who have two other convents in the diocese. The congregation numbers in all 63 religious of whom 30 are priests. The Jacobites took up their residence at Mossul at an early date, especially at the Convent of Mar Mattai, the principal centre of their activity. There also since 1089 dwells the "Maphrian" or delegate of the patri- arch for the ecclesiastical provinces in Persia, a title or office now purely honorary. The Monophysites are very numerous in the city and the diocese. The Syr- ian Catholic diocese numbers 6,000 souls; 20 priests; 7 parishes; and 10 churches. Le Quien (Oriens christ., II, 1.5.59-1.564) gives a Ust of Jacobite titularies of Mossul.

The Apostolic Mission of Mossul was founded in 1750 by Benedict XIV as a Prefecture Apostolic and entrusted to the Italian Dominicans who had re- peatedly laboured in the province from the thirteenth century onwards. Thanks to them, a Syrian Catho- lic diocese was erected at Mossul in that same year. In 1780, the Nestorian patriarch Mar Yohannan, who resided at Alkosh, 25 miles north-east of Mossul, be- came a Catholic together with five bishops of his na- tion, the greater part of the inhabitants of his town, and of six villages in the vicinity. The French monks who replaced the Italians were able in 1856, thanks to M. Bori5, and to the French Consul, the Assyriologist Botta, to open boys' and girls' schools, and to found a printing press for Arabic and Syriac works, and finally a college at Mossul. The Apostolic Mis.sion at the present day is bounded by three other French Mis- sions, those of the Capuchins at Mardin, the Carmel- ites at Bagdad, and the Lazarists in Persia. It in- cludes the south-east of Mesopotamia, Kurdistan, and the north-east of Armenia Major, a stretch of territory covering the vilayets of Mossul, Bitlis, Van, and a part of Diarbekir. Besides the Arabs, Kurds, and Mussul- man Turks (about 3,000,000), and the Yezidis or De\nl-worshippprs (about 30,000), the Mission num- bers 300,000 schismatic Armenians; 70.000 Jacobites;

30,000 Nestorians; 5000 Protestants; and 10,000 Jews. The Catholics of all the rites scattered through the territory amount to 80,000. The Mission has 23 Latin ijriests, all Dominicans, and 15 native priests who assist them in teaching. There are 9 Latin churches, 5 residential stations (Mossul, founded in 1750; Mar-Yakoub in 1847; Van in 1881; Seert in 1882; Djczireh in 1884), and 98 secondary stations visited by the missionaries. In 1910 a station was founded in the heart of the Nestorian patriarchate. The Syro-Chaldean Seminary, founded at Mossul in 1882, has educated more than 60 priests; it has be- tween 50 and 60 students. There are 50 parochial schools for boys; 8 for girls; 1 Normal School for Chal- dean Catholic teachers at Mar-Yakoub; 3 colleges for boys; 4 boarding schools for girls; 4 orphanages opened in consequence of the massacres of 1895. The Do- minicanesses of the Presentation have houses at Mos- sul, Seert, and Van.

CuiNET, La Turguie d'Asie. II (Paris, 1892), 81S-S27; Pio- LET, Les Missions, I (Paris), 256-271; Missiones Cath. (Rome, 1907), 162, 806-8.

S. Vailh^. Mostar and Markana-Trebinje, Dioceses op

(M.\NDATRIENSIS, M AKrAXENSIS KT TrIBUNENSIS).

When at the Berlin Congress (1S7S) Austria-Hungary was allowed to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina, the religious situation was at once regulated. The re- ligious hatred existing until then between the Ortho- dox (673,000, 43 per cent), Mohammedans (549,000, 35 per cent), Catholics (330,000, 21 per cent), and Jews (8000, 0.5 per cent), was moderated. In 1881 the Emperor Francis Joseph formed the ecclesiastical province of Sarajevo (Bosna-Serai; Sarahimur) with the three sees of Banjaluka (Banialucus), Mostar, and Markana-Trebinje as suffragans. The Bishop of Mostar, through his pro-vicar, administers Markana- Trebinje, in which there are only eight secular priests and 20,000 Catholics.

Mostar is the capital of Herzegovina, and numbers 15,000 inhabitants, among whom there are 3500 Catholics. Herzegovina, which lies east of southern Dalmatia, received its name from the title of Herzog (duke) conferred by the Emperor Frederick IV (1448) on the Grand Waywode Stephan Vukcic. In 146.3 Stephan Tomasevid, the last King of Bosnia, was made a prisoner by the Turks and beheaded, in de- fiance of a promise to spare him. Twenty years later Herzegovina came under the rule of Turkey. With Bosnia it received Christianity from the Romans. In the first half of the seventh century the Slavs took possession. In the eleventh century the Eastern Schism and the sect of the Bogomili did the Catholic Church great and unrepaired harm. National writ- ers trace this sect to a Bulgarian priest, Jeremias, who was also called Bogomil. His followers were called Patarenes; they rejected matrimony, allowed no intercourse with those of other religions, uncondition- ally forbade war and taking of oaths, and wished to yield obedience to no authority but God. In 1483, during the Turkish occupation of the country, the majority of the Bogomili, those of the upper classes, went over to Mohammedanism. Those who re- mained faithful to Christianity became outlaws (Ka- jaks). After the siege of Vienna and the retreat of the Turks in 1683, the poor peasants repeatedly took up arms, but only made their condition worse. During this imhappy time the Franciscans, unaided and with great difficulty, preserved the life of the Catholic Church in the country. Not seldom they celebrated Divine service amid the cold and snow in the open air. They lived in the most wretched poverty, and many became martyrs.

The Franciscans deserved that one of their order should be chosen Bishop of Mostar and Markana- Trebinje in 1881. The order maintains two schools and six classes for the education of the rising genera-