Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/176

This page needs to be proofread.

NUEVA CACERES


148


NUEVA CACERES


andria Monophysites, and in this way became and remained Jacobites or Copts. In the following ren- turics niimiTous t-hurches and monasteries were built even in I'pper Nubia and Sennar, the ruins of which yet remain. Other documents show that Nubia was divided into three provinces with seventeen bi.shojis: Maracu with the sulTraKaii Dioceses of Korta, Jbrim, Bucoras, Dunkala, Sai, Ternius, and Suenkur; Albaiha with Borra, Gagara, Martin, Arodias, Banazi, and JMenkesa; Niexaniitis with Soper, Coucharim, Takclii, and .\niankul. Yet Christianity was in continual danger from the Mohannnedaiis. Nubia succeeded in freeing itself from the control of Egypt, which be- came an independent Mohanunedan kingdom in 909, but in 1173 Saladin's brother Schems Eddawalah Turansehah aclvan<'e(l from Yemen, destroyed the churches, anil carried off the bishoj) and 70,000 Nu- bians. At the same time Northern Nubia was con- quered. In 127.5 the Mameluke sultan Djahn Bei- bars .sent an army from Egypt into Nubia. Dongola was conquered, the Christian king David was obliged to flee, and the churches were plundered. The inhab- itants escaped forcible conversion to Mohammedan- ism only by payment of a head-tax. Nubia was di- vided into jjctty states, chief of which was Sennar, founded in I4S4 by the negro Funji. Por some time Sennar ruled Shendi, Berber, and Dongola. In the eighteenth centurj- the King of Sennar obtained for a time Kordofan also. From the Middle Ages there is httle information as to the position of Christianity; Islam became supreme, ])artly by force, partly by the amalgamation of the native with the Arabian tribes.

In 1821 Sennar and the dependent provinces sub- mitted to Mohammed All, the founder of modern Egj-pt. The commanding position of the capital, Khartoum, led the Holy See to hope that the conver- sion of Central Africa could be effected from Nubia. On 2(5 December, 1845. the ProjKiganda erected a vicariate, confirmed by < liit^nry W'l, 3 .\pril, 1846. The Austrian imperial family loni rilmtcd funds and the mission was under the prnlcrtiun of the Austrian con- sulate at Khartoum. Missionary work was begun by the Jesuits Ryllo (d. 1S48J and Knoblecher (d. 1858), who pushed forward as far as 4° 10' north of the equa- tor, Kirchner, and several secular priests (among whom were Haller, d. 1854, and Gerbl, d. 1857). They founded stations at Heiligenkreuz on the Abiad (1855), and at Santa Maria in Gondokoro (1851). In 1861 the missions were transferred to the Franciscans. Father Daniel Comboni (d. at Khartoum, 1881) founded an institute at ^'erona for the training of mis- sionaries to labour among the negroes of Soudan. The Pious Mothers of the Negro Country {Pie Madri della Nigrizia), founded in 1867, devoted itself to con- ducting schools for girls and dispensaries. The Mahdi, Mohammed Ahmed, in 1880 conquered Kordofan, in 1883 vanquished the Egyptian army, and on 26 January, 1885, destroyed Khartoum. A number of priests and sisters were held for years in captivity ; the name of Christian seemed obliterated. After the overthrow of his successor, Caliph Abdullah, by the EngUsh under Lord Kitchener, 2 September, 1898, the miiision was re-established. In 1895 a mis- sion had been opened at Assuan. In 1899 Mgr Roveg- gio w^itli Fathers \\'eiler and Huber established a station at Omdunnan, and in 1900 founded the mission near the Shilluk and re-established the station at Khartoum. Under his successor, Geyer, stations were opened in 1904 at Halfaya, Lul, Atiko, Kayango; in 1905 at Mbili arnong the Djur, at Wau in Bahr el Ghazal, and the mission at Suakin, opened in 1885, was resumed. The Sons of the Sacred Cro.ss, as the Missionaries of Verona had been called from 1887, founded a station at Port Sudan.

Starting from Khartoum the missionary territory ia divided into a northern and a southern district. The majority of the population in the north is Mohamme-


dan, and the chief task of the missionaries is pastoral work among the scattered Christian communities. In 19()S Kliartoum ha<l ti9,341 inhabitants, Onidurman 57,9S5, among them about 2307 Europeans, of whom about 1000 are Catholics. Khartoum is served by 2 fathers, 1 brother, and 4 sisters; the schools contain 42 boys and 75 girls. In Onulurmau there are 300 Cath- olics, 3 fathers. 1 brother, and 5 sisters; 44 boys and 45 girls attend the school. There is also a school for girls at Halfaya. At A.ssuan there are 2 fathers, 1 brother, and 4 sisters; 34 boys and 54 girls are taught in the schools. There are 500 Catholics among the workmen. At Port Sudan the Catholics number between 200 and 300. There are Catholics also at Haifa, Abu-Hammed, Dongola, Argo, Meraui, Ber- ber, Atbara, Damer, Shendi, Kassala, Duen, El- Obeid, Bara, and Nahud. The southern missions among the heathen negroes have already advanced beyond the boundaries of Nubia. The statistics for 1907 for the northern and southern missions were: 11 stations, 30 priests, 23 brothers, 41 sisters, 2407 Cath- olics, 492 boys and girls in the mission-schools.

Renaudot, LituTgiarum orietilatium cullectio (2 vola., Paris, 1716); Le Quien, Oriens christianus, II (Paris, 1740), 659-62; QcvTREMfeRE, Memoires giographiques et historigues sur I'Egypte, II (Paris, 1811), 1-161; Bokckhardt, Travels in Nubia (London, 1819): NiEBUHR. Inscriplionea Nubienses (Rome, 1820); Gau, Antiquites de la Nubie (Paris, 1821-2); Rosellini, I monumenti dell Egitto e della Nubia (Pisa, 1832-44); Champollion, Monu- ments de I'Egypte et de la Nubie (2 vols., Paris. 1844); Makrizi, Gesch. der Copten, tr. \VC.stp:n-feld (Gottingen, 184,5); Lane- Poole, Wis(. of Eiiur' >• ■ -1/ /•//' Ages (London, 1901); Butler, The Arab Conqu, I ■ I ' ' '..l-.rd, 1902); KuMM, Nubim von Asswin bis Donti"! • - ' i "li); Cook, Handbuuk fur Egypt and the Sudan (I,..ii.l..ii, I'n;, (;i.;ver in Kalholische Missionen (Freiburg, 1908).

Otto Hartig.

NuevaCaceres, Diocese OF (Nov.\C.\CEREs), created in 1595 by Clcincnt VIII ; it is one of the four suffragan sees of the Archdiocese of Manila, Philippine Islands. It comprises the provinces of Camarines Sur, Cama- rines Norte, ."^-Ibay, and Tayabas in the southern part of Luzon, the islands Ticao, Masbate, Burias, and Cantanduanes, also numerous smaller islands off the coast of Southern Luzon. It includes a territory of 13,632 square miles, and has a population of nearly 600,000. The cathedral and episcopal residence are situated in the town of Nueva Caceres, the capital of Camarines Sur. The territory now included in the diocese was first visited by Augustinian Friars, who had accompanied the famous Legaspi-Urdaneta ex- pedition of 1565. When the missionaries began their labours, they found the natives given over to gross idolatries and superstitions (adoration of the sun, moon, and stars, ancestral worship), and to the pro- pitiation of a multitude of deities by strange sacrifices; nor did they seem to have any idea of a supreme being. So fruitful, however, was the apostolic zeal of the missionaries that, within a few years, many thousands of converts were made in Albay, in Ca- marines Sur, and in Masbate. Assisted by heroic Catholiclaymen, they gathered the natives into villages or reductions, where they instructed them in the truths of religion and taught them the advantages of a settled civilized life. The Augustinians had begun the spiritual conquest of the diocese, but, being few in number, they were unable to attend to so extensive a territory. In 1578 the Franciscans were called to assist them. The arrival of the latter gave a new im- pulse to the work of evangelization. Missions and re- ductions were multiplied in Albay, in Camarines Sur, and in Masbate; and new foundations were made in the Province of Tayabas. The ranks of the mission- aries were strengthened from time to time l)y workers from Spain and Mexico; as early as 1595 the Church had niadesomuch progress in these parts that Clement VIII created the Diocese of Nueva Caceres, taking the name from the town of Nueva Cdceres founded in Ca- marines Sur in 1.579 by Francisco de Sande, second Governor-General of the Philippine Islands. The