482 Lizzi Testa
first bishop of Ravenna to exercise this right. However, his authority, though
not necessarily metropolitan, was known to eastern bishops. In 431, some of
these asked John of Antioch to address letters in their name to the bishop of
Ravenna, as well as to the bishops of Milan and Aquileia, since all three con
demned the Apollinarism of Cyril of Alexandria.8 The growth of Ravenna into
an episcopal see is not surprising. The city, where Galla Placidia and Valentinian
III were living, had followed the same destiny as Constantinople over the last
two decades of the 4th century, when Theodosius I was its resident.
A testimony to Ravenna as a separate metropolis is also offered by the list of
subscribers to the Council of Milan in 451, which Pope Leo had asked Eusebius
of Milan to gather in order to publicize the good results of an embassy sent
to Constantinople.9 A similar request was also given to the bishop of Arles,
Ravennius, under whose presidency the same year the bishops of Viennensis,
Narbonnensis, and AlpesMaritimes were gathered together.10 Tellingly absent
from the Council of Milan, however, were the bishops of Ravenna, Cervia,
Rimini, Cesena, and Forlimpopoli (Regio VIII, including the province of
Flaminia et Aemilia), as well as those of Faenza (Faventia), Bologna (Bononia),
Modena (Mutina), Voghenza (Vicohabentia), and Imola (Forum Cornelii), which
certainty existed as a diocese in 451,11 some of which Milan had extended its
jurisdiction over from at least the second half of the 4th century.12
It is hard to accept that all these sees were included in the metropolis of
Suburbicarian Italy dependent on the bishop of Rome. Missing from the list in
fact are the bishops of Regio X (with the exceptions of Brescia and Cremona),13
over which the see of Aquileia, then the point of reference for the dioceses
of Raetia Secunda, Noricum, and Pannonia Prima and Savia, had extended
its influence during the second half of the 4th century.14 We should, there
fore, believe that Leo I had also corresponded with the bishops of Ravenna
8 John of Antioch’s letter is mentioned by Theodoretus, Ep. 112, ed. Y. Azéma, p. 52.
9 The list of subscribers is preserved in the synodical letter that Bishop Cyriacus of Lodi was
commissioned to deliver to Leo I. See Eusebius Med., Ep., in Leo I, Ep. 97.3, PL 54, p. 947;
cf. PCBE 2.1, s. v. Cyriacus 3, pp. 521–52.
10 Leo wanted to make known in the West that his authority, undermined by the Council of
Ephesus in 449, had been successfully reestablished in East. See Ep. syn. Episc. Galliae 1,
ed. Munier, pp. 107–10.
11 Lanzoni, Le diocesi d’Italia, vol. 2, p. 751.
12 In 386 Ambrose communicated the date of Easter to the bishops of Aemilia (Dominis
fratribus dilectissimis episcopis per Aemiliam constitutis). See Ambr., Ep. Extra coll. 13,
ed. M. Zelzer (23M. coll. 1026–1035).
13 Lizzi Testa, “Le origini del Cristianesimo”, p. 392.
14 Cracco Ruggini, “Storia totale di una piccola città”, pp. 285–6, n. 328.