The earliest mentions of episcopal sees of Ulcinj and Bar: a philological–archaeological note

Opis

This paper analyzes written and material sources concerning the earliest history of the Episcopal sees of Ulcinj and Bar, because there are still some ambiguities in the interpretation of the date of composition and the content of episcopal notita 3 published by Gustav Parthey in 1866, and the notitia 10 published in the critical edition of Jean Darrouzès in 1981, where they are both mentioned. Two notitae are actually the same list of metropolitans of the Constantinopolitan church, where were listed fifteen suffragan bishops of Durrachium. Although the compilation of that part of the list is dated in the end of the 10th or the beginning of the 11th century, the confusion produced at the beginning of the last century by dating this notitia in the middle of the 8th century still persists in literature. That misinterpretation consequently brought some scholars to the conclusion that the bishoprics in question were founded in the first half of the 8th century. Tracing the origin of that false interpretation proved that there is no firm scientific grounds for the assertion that Bar and Ulcinj had the bishops on that early date. Another problem considered in this paper is the identification of the bishop seat ĝ ÀÁÀÅţ»ÑÅ mentioned before ĝ ÅÌÀ¹ÚɼÑË in notitia 10. o ÀÁÀÅţ»ÑÅ has been recently identified by some scholars as Ohrid and not as Ulcinj. Analysis of the Latin and Greek written sources demonstrates that the confusion comes from the similar orthography of these two citi