1. Metropolis of Mokissos
The metropolis of Mokissos, also known as the metropolis of Justinianopolis, was established during the reign of Justinian I, c. 536 AD, as the head of a new ecclesiastical district within the province of Cappadocia II, known as Nova Justiniana.1 It survived throughout the Byzantine era. According to the Byzantine notitiae episcopatuum, the metropolis of Mokissos is ranked 18th, 26th, 29th or 36th among the metropolitan sees belonging to the Patriarchate of Constantinople.2 The last reference to it as the ‘metropolis of Justinianopolis’ dates to 692 AD, when its metropolitan Theopemptos participated in the Quinisext ecclesiastical council at Constantinople.3 The bishoprics of Nazianzos, Koloneia, Parnassos, Doaron and Matiane, located to the south of the Halys River -the region which we should identify as the purview of the Mokissos metropolis- belonged to it.4 During the Late Byzantine period, and especially during the reign of Michael VIIΙ Palaiologos (1261 -1282), the bishopric of Proikon(n)esos in Bithynia also belonged to the metropolis of Mokissos kat epidosin.5
1. Procopius, Buildings, ed J. Haury, Procopius IV, De aedifidis libri VI (Leipzig 1913, repr. Leipzig 1964), p. 158. See also Honigmann, Ε., Le "Corpus notitiarum episcopatuum," Byzantion 11 (1936), p. 354.
2. Darrouzès, J. (ed.), Notitiae Episcopatuum Ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae (Paris 1981), nos. 1. 31, 408; 2. 30, 477; 3. 23, 338; 4. 31, 429; 5. 26; 6. 26; 7. 29, 507; 8. 30; 9. 391; 10. 460; 11. 30; 12. 29; 13. 460, 782; 14. 32; 15. 29; 16. 29; 17. 36; 18. 36; 19. 39; 20. 29, 47.
3. Mansi, J.D. (ed.), Sacrorum Conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio, vol. 11 (Firenze 1769, repr. Graz 1960), columns 692D, 992A.
4. Hild, F., Das byzantinische Strassensystem in Kappadokien (Wien 1977), pp. 50-51.
5. Pachymeres, ed. A. Failler, Georges Pachymeres, Relations Historiques, vol. 2 (CFHB 24/2, Paris 1984), p. 373.