Bigadiç

Bigadiç is a town and district of Balıkesir Province in the Marmara region of Turkey. As former Ancient bishopric of Achyraus, it remains a Latin Catholic titular see.

Bigadiç
District
Bigadiç
Coordinates: 39°23′33″N 28°07′52″E
Country Turkey
ProvinceBalıkesir
Government
 • Mayorİsmail Avcu (AKP)
Area
 • District1,028.50 km2 (397.11 sq mi)
Population
 (2012)[2]
 • Urban
17,226
 • District
49,174
 • District density48/km2 (120/sq mi)
Time zoneUTC+2
Area code(s)0266
Websitehttp://www.bigadic.gov.tr/

Bigadiç has the largest Boron reserves of both Turkey and the world. Also, villages of Bigadiç have natural thermal water reserves which contains Selenium and Sulfur.

Etymology

The oldest known name of Bigadiç is ancient Greek Achyraos (Αχυράους in Ancient Greek), Latin(ized) Achyraus, renamed during the Byzantine era Pegadia (Πηγάδια), which means "springs, wells", from which it evolved to Begadia, to Begados, and eventually to the Turkishized name Bugadıç. Some support the popular etymology that Boğadıç would mean "Bull meadow" (Boğa being the Turkish word for a bull).

Ecclesiastical history

Ancient Achyraus was situated in the Roman province of Hellespontus, in the civil Diocese of Pontus. Circa 400 it became a suffragan see of the provincial capital and metropolitan see Cyzicus, in the sway of Patriarchate of Constantinople.

It is held either identical with former episcopal see Adrianothera,[3] or to have supplanted a neighbouring bishopric of that name, as the Byzantine imperial Notitia Episcopatuum still listed that name in the tenth century, thereafter only Achiraus from the 11th until the thirteenth century.

Four bishops of Adrianothera are known because of their participation in church councils :

Two 13th-century bishops of Achyraus are recorded under that title in the thirteenth century : Leo and Laurentius.[4][5]

Although it was suppressed as a residential Byzantine see (circa 900?), one Tommaso (no other prelature) was appointed Latin Coadjutor Bishop of Achyraus (1505.06.06 – ?).

Titular see

The diocese of Achyraus was nominally restored in 1933 by the Catholic Church as Latin titular bishopric of Achyraus (Latin) / Achirao (Curiate Italian) / Achyraëb(sis) (Latin adjective).[6]

It is vacant, having had the following incumbents, so far of the fitting Episcopal (lowest) rank and members of Latin congregations :

  • Victor Bazin, Paris Foreign Missions Society (M.E.P.) (1953.05.07 – 1955.01.01) as last Apostolic Vicar of Rangoon (Burma = Myanmar) (1953.05.07 – 1955.01.01); next (see) promoted first Metropolitan Archbishop of Rangoon (Myanmar) (1955.01.01 – retired 1971.06.19), President of Myanmar Catholic Bishops’ Conference (1967 – 1969), died 1975
  • Cesário Alexandre Minali, Capuchin Friars Minor (O.F.M. Cap.) (born Italy) (1955.03.01 – 1969.06.13), first as Bishop-Prelate of Territorial Prelature of Alto Solimões (Brazil) (1955.03.01 – 1958.04.09), then as Bishop-Prelate of Territorial Prelature of Carolina (Brazil) (1958.04.09 – death 1969.06.13)
  • Augustín Van Aaken, Divine Word Missionaries (S.V.D.) (born Germany) (1972.07.25 – death 1990.08.11) as Bishop-Prelate of Territorial Prelature of Alto Paraná (Paraguay) (1972.07.25 – death 1990.04.19).

Notes and references
  1. "Area of regions (including lakes), km²". Regional Statistics Database. Turkish Statistical Institute. 2002. Retrieved 2013-03-05.
  2. "Population of province/district centers and towns/villages by districts - 2012". Address Based Population Registration System (ABPRS) Database. Turkish Statistical Institute. Retrieved 2013-02-27.
  3. Gustav Parthey, Synecdemus et notitiae Graecae episcopatuum (A. M. Hakkert, 1967 reprint), p. 332
  4. Sophrone Pétridès, v. Achyraus, in Dictionnaire d'Histoire et de Géographie ecclésiastiques, vol. I, Paris 1909, col. 333
  5. Michel Lequien, Oriens christianus in quatuor Patriarchatus digestus, Paris 1740, Vol. I, coll. 771-772
  6. Annuario Pontificio 2013 (Libreria Editrice Vaticana 2013 ISBN 978-88-209-9070-1), p. 823
Bibliography - ecclesiastical history
  • Konrad Eubel, Hierarchia Catholica Medii Aevi, vol. 3, p. 217.
  • Pius Bonifacius Gams, Series episcoporum Ecclesiae Catholicae, Leipzig 1931, p. 445
  • Michel Lequien, Oriens christianus in quatuor Patriarchatus digestus, Paris 1740, vol. I, coll. 771-772
  • S. Pétridès, lemma 'Achyraus' in Dictionnaire d'Histoire et de Géographie ecclésiastiques, vol. I, Paris 1909, col. 333
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