Roman Catholic Diocese of Angoulême

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Angoulême is a diocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic church in France. Originally erected in the 3rd century, the episcopal see is the Angoulême Cathedral. Comprising the département of the Charente, the diocese has always been suffragan to the Archbishopric of Bordeaux, under the old régime as well as under the Concordat.

History

Its first bishop was Ausonius, a disciple, it is said, of St. Martial, concerning whom we have two historical authorities: St. Gregory of Tours, who held that St. Martial preached the gospel in Limoges about the year 250, and the Limousin traditions, transmitted or invented by the chronicler Adhémar de Chabannes, who maintained that St. Martial was the immediate disciple of St. Peter. According to the latter opinion St. Ausonius was a bishop of the first century; according to the former, of the third century.

St. Salvius, honoured as a martyr at Valenciennes, whom the Gallia Christiana makes a Bishop of Angoulême, was undoubtedly only a missionary bishop of the eighth century. In the list of the Bishops of Angoulême is found the name of the poet Octavien de St. Gelais (1494–1502).

The religious monuments of the province of Angoumois are remarkable for their admirable Romano-Byzantine façades. The most beautiful of them is St. Peter's Cathedral at Angoulême. The memory of a wealthy and famous Augustinian abbey, founded in 1122, is kept alive by its ruins at Couronne, near Angoulême.

Ordinaries

• Antoine de La Barre † (14 Jan 1524 Appointed - 15 Jul 1527 Appointed, Archbishop of Tours)
• Dominique Lacombe † (11 Apr 1802 Appointed - 7 Apr 1823 Died)
• Jean-Joseph-Pierre Guigou † (10 Sep 1823 Appointed - 21 May 1842 Died)
• René-François Régnier † (15 Jun 1842 Appointed - 16 May 1850 Appointed, Archbishop of Cambrai)
• Antoine-Charles Cousseau † (17 Jun 1850 Appointed - 12 Aug 1872 Resigned)
• Alexandre-Léopold Sebaux † (16 Dec 1872 Appointed - 17 May 1891 Died)
• Jean-Baptiste Frérot † (2 Apr 1892 Appointed - 6 Sep 1899 Died)
• Jean Louis Mando † (7 Dec 1899 Appointed - 24 Jul 1900 Died)
• Joseph-François-Ernest Ricard † (5 Apr 1901 Appointed - 15 Apr 1907 Appointed, Archbishop of Auch)
• Henri-Marie Arlet † (7 Aug 1907 Appointed - 15 May 1933 Died)
• Jean-Baptiste Mégnin † (7 Dec 1933 Appointed - 9 May 1965 Died)
• René-Noël-Joseph Kérautret † (9 May 1965 Succeeded - 1 Jul 1975 Resigned)
• Georges Rol (1 Jul 1975 Succeeded - 22 Dec 1993 Resigned)
• Claude Jean Pierre Dagens (22 Dec 1993 Succeeded - )

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.