Sion, Switzerland - History - Seat of A Catholic Bishop

Seat of A Catholic Bishop

The Roman Catholic diocese of Sion is the oldest in Switzerland and one of the oldest north of the Alps. At first the see was sited at Octodurum, now called Martigny/Martinach. The first authentically historical bishop was Saint Theodore/Theodolus (died in 391), who was present at the Council of Aquileia in 381. He founded the Abbey of Saint-Maurice, with a small church in honor of Saint Maurice, martyred there ca. 300, when he united the local hermits in a common life, thus beginning the Abbey of Saint-Maurice, the oldest north of the Alps. Theodore rebuilt the church at Sion, which had been destroyed by Emperor Maximinus at the beginning of the fourth century. At first the new diocese was a suffragan of the archdiocese of Vienne; later it became suffragan of Tarentaise.

In 589 the bishop, St. Heliodorus, transferred the see to Sion, leaving the low-lying, flood-prone site of Octodurum, where the Drance joins the Rhone. Though frequently the early bishops were also abbots of Saint-Maurice, the monastic community was jealously watchful that the bishops should not extend their jurisdiction over the abbey. Several of the bishops united both offices: Wilcharius (764-780), previously Archbishop of Vienne, whence he had been driven by the Moors; St. Alteus, who received from the pope a bull of exemption in favor of the monastery (780); Aimo II, son of Count Humbert I of Savoy, who entertained Leo IX at Saint-Maurice in 1049.

The first cathedral is probably from the 6th Century. It was halfway up the hill, where later the church of St. Peter stood, until the 19th Century when that church was demolished.

The fortunes of the city grew when the bishop settled there. In 999, King Rudolph III of Burgundy granted the entire County of Valais to the Bishop, and Sion became the capital of this County. The Prince-Bishop had the rights of high and low justice, the right to his own regalia and to appoint his own vassals. The residents of Sion were ruled by three appointees of the Bishop, the maior, the vice dominus or Viztum and the salterus.