Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 2.djvu/242

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B^UMER


202


BAGDAD


Baeumer, Suitbert, liistorian of the Breviary and one of the most scholarly patrologists of the nine- teenth centurj% b. 2S March, 1S45 at Leuchtenberg near Kaij;erswerth (Rhine): d. at Freiburg 12 Au- gust, 1S94. He made his miiversity studies at Bonn and Tubingen; in 1865 he entered the Benedictine Abbey of Beuron, then ncnlj' founded, and was or- dained priest, in 1869. The years 1875-90 were spent at Maredsous Abbey in Belgium and at Er- dington in England; in the latter year he returned to Beuron. Dom Bseunier was long the critical adviser of the printing house of DescMe, Lefebvre and associates at Tournai, for their editions of the Missal, Breviary, Ritual, Pontifical, and other li- turgical works. He contributed to leading reviews a number of valuable essays, e. g. on the Stowe Missal (the oldest liturgical record of the Irish Church) in the " Zeitsclirift f. kath. Theologie" (1892), on the author of the "Micrologus" (an im- portant medieval liturgical treatise) in "Neues Archiv" (1893), on the " Sacramentarium Gelas- ianum" in the " Historisches Jahrbuch" (1893). He also wrote a life of Mabillon (1892) and a treatise on the historj' anil content of the Apostles' Creed (1893). His most important work is the classical history of the Roman Breviary "Geschichte des Breviers" (Freiburg, 1895; French tr., R. Biron, Paris, 1905). In this work he condensed the labours of several generations of erudite students of the Bre\"iary and the best critical results of the modern school of historical liturgists.

.1/7^. deutsche Biographie, XLVI, 257, and the biographical account prefixed to the German and French texts of his history of tlie Breviary.

Thom.^s J. Sh.vh.\n.

Bagamoyo, Vicari.\te Apostolic of, in German East Africa, separated by a pontifical Decree of 11 May, 1906, from the Vicariate Apostolic of North- ern Zanzibar. The Catholics number 14,728 (in all German East Africa there are about 6,700,000 na- tives, most of whom belong to mixeil tribes of the Bantu race). The mission is cared for by the Congre- gation of the Holy Ghost and the Immaculate Heart of Mary (52) and by the Trappists (S), aided by two congregations of women: Filles de Marie (7), and Sisters of the Precious Blood, formerly Trappistines (28). The first vicar Apostolic, Rt. Rev. Franz Xaver Vogt, of the Congregation of the Holy Ghost, was elected 25 July, 1906. There are 15 churches and chapels, 15 stations with medical service, 15 orphanages, 6 industrial, or trade, and agricultural, schools, 71 schools with 7,574 native pupils, 2 leper stations, and 2 hospitals. The vicar Apostolic re- sides at Bagamoyo, a small seaport town near the mouth of Kingani, opposite the Island of Zanzibar, and the centre of the telegraph and cable systems of the colony. (See Africa.)

MUsiones Cathoiicce (Propaganda, Rome. 1907), 427; l^tates- men's Year-Book (London, 1907). 1021-22. 225-226; Heil- prin'a GazzeUeer (Philadelphia, 19061, 146. 711. 2047.

Thom.\s J. Shah.vn.

Bagdad. — This city was founded on the Tigris by the second Abbaside Caliph Abou Giafar al Mansur (762 or 764) and named by him Medinet es-Selam, or City of Salvation; Bagdad is a popular name said to mean "Garden of Dat ", a Mussulman dervish. During five centuries it was the rich and brilliant capital of the famous Arabian Empire. Houlagou, a grandson of Genghis Khan, entered it in 1262; it afterwards became a possession of the Kara Koyouli Turks, was taken by Tamerlane, and. in 1517, fell into the hands of the Persians who, except for a short interval in the sixteenth century, ruled over it tintil 1638, when Sultan Murad made it definitively a city of the Ottoman Empire. It is now the chief town of a vilayet, or district, of the same name, and has lost much of its former importance, though it


still remains the most important city of Asiatic Turkey, after Damascus and Smyrna, and a great emporium of international trade. It exports tex- tile fabrics, gold and silverware, horses, dates, etc. There are many beautiful mosques in the city, and the ruins of its ancient walls are still visible. The climate is hot; fevers are frequent, and the plague sometimes appears. Its population, taken as in- cluding the neighbouring villages, is said to be about 145,000; of these 86,000 are Mussulmans, mostly Arab Sunnites and Persian Shiites; 52,000 are Jews, and 7,000 Christians. Turkish statistics, however, are usually very uncertain. The Christians are divided as follows: 3,300 Armenians (including about 1,000 Catholics and 100 Protestants), 100 Greeks (.50 Catholics); l.liOO (3,000?) Chaldeans; 1,200 Syrians; and 500 Latins.

In 1638, after the Turkish conquest, owing to the previous kindness of .\bbas the Great, Urban VIII created, at the expense of a pious French lady, a Latin bishopric for the CathoUcs in Persia, under the title of Babylon, the old city being then (though erroneously) identified with Bagdad. For a long time the bishops of this title, when they came to the East, resided at Hamadan, in Persia, and for various reasons there were often no bishops, but only vicars Apostolic. It was only in 1742 that Pere Joseph-Marie de J^sus, a Carmelite, was allowed to enter this Mussulman town. In 1848 the see became an archbishopric, with Ispahan as a suffragan see, till 1874; the archbishop, Monsignor Trioche, was appointed Apostolic Delegate for the Catholics of Oriental rites. He resigned this office in 18.50, and until his death, in 1887, there were special delegates, the last of whom, Monsignor Altmayer, succeeded him and reunited both titles, as did his successor, Monsignor Jean Drure. We must here, moreover, notice that the Latin Archbishop of Bagdad, accord- ing to the decree of Urban VIII, must always be of French nationality.

The limits of the ecclesiastical pro\'ince extend as far as As.sjTia, Mesopotamia, and the territories of Bassorah and Amida, with about 2,000 Latin faith- ful, mostly foreigners. It includes three Apostolic prefectures: Bagdad, Mardin, and Mossul. The Pre- fecture of Bagdad is governed by French Discalced Carmelites, who have at Bagdad a large and beauti- ful college, an elementarj- school, a dispensary, and stations at Bassorah, Amarah, and Bushire, witii primary schools and some ten churches or little chapels. French Sisters of the Presentation of Toms conduct at Bagdad an important school for girls and an orphans' institute. For the Prefectures of Mardin (French Capuchins) and Mossul (French Dominicans i, see articles under these titles.

The Apostolic Delegation of Bagdad, for Mesopo- tamia, Kurdistan, and .\rmenia Minor, is, as appears from its official appellation, more extensive than the I^atin archbishopric. It embraces 5 Armenian dio- ceses, with 40 priests and about 12,000 faithful; 5 SjTian dioceses, with 80 priests and about 12,000 faithful; 9 Chaldean dioceses, T\-ith 160 priests and about 40,000 faithful.

Since the foundation of the Chaldean patriarchate by Innocent XI in 1681, after the conversion of a great many Nestorians, the Chaldean patriarch bears the title of Babylon, i. e. Bagdad. His residence was first at Diarbekir, then at Bagdad (since about 1838), and is now at Mossul. A Syrian archbishopric was also erected in 1862, with the same title of Baby- lon, or Bagdad; and the titular resides, or is author- ized to reside, at Bagdad.

According to Bar-Hebrteus ("Chronicon Eocl. ", ed. Lamy, II, 236), Elias, the Greek Patriarch of Antioch, in 910 re-established at Bagdad the ancient residence of the Orthodox Catholicos which had been unoccupied since the Nestorian Schism (432). The