Situated on the
River Drôme, Die was one of the nineteen principal towns of the tribe of the
Vocontii. It was made a Roman colony by the Emperor Augustus in the 20s B.C. No episcopal list exists for the diocese of Die. There is no myth, legend, or tradition with regard to the bringing of Christianity to the area or the foundation of the diocese. Die first appears in the record when Bishop Nicasius attended the Council of Nicaea in 325. The Cathedral of Die was dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. The Cathedral Chapter had two dignities, the Dean and the Sacristan, and ten other Canons. In the thirteenth century the diocese was divided for administrative purposes into four Archpresbyteries: the
Archpriest of Die, the Archpriest of Trivilis (Trièves), the Archpriest of Deserto, the Archpriest of Crista. There was a Collegiate Church at Crest (Crista) dedicated to Saint-Sauveur, which had a Provost, a Cantor, and six Canons. After the eleventh century the Diocese of Die, long disputed between the
metropolitans of Vienne and
Arles, became
suffragan of the
archbishopric of Vienne. and Guillaume of Poitiers of the abbeys of S. Marcel de Die, Saint-Medard, Saint-Croix, Saint Julien-de-Guiniaise, Leoncel, and Saou. The bull also confirms the possession of the entire city of Die and nine castle-towns including Crista.
Union of diocese of Die and diocese of Valence By
Papal Bull of 25 September 1275, in order to strengthen the Church of Valence in its struggle with the House of Poitiers,
Gregory X united the Diocese of Die with that of Valence. It was no accident that Amadeus of Roussillon was the nephew of Amadeus of Geneva, Bishop of Die. Amadeus of Roussillon was present at the bedside of his uncle when he made his Testament on 21 January 1276. Bishop Amadeus of Die died on 22 October 1276, and his nephew Amadeus of Roussillon became Bishop of Valence and Die.
Diocese of Die revived This union, which lasted four centuries, was unfortunate for the Church in Die. On 10 September 1692, the Bishop of Die, Armand de Montmorin Saint-Hérem, had an interview with
James II of England and Louis XIV. Asked for a report on the state of the Dauphiné,
inter alia the Bishop reported that Die was entirely in the hands of the Huguenots.
French Revolution In 1790 the
Civil Constitution of the Clergy reduced the number of dioceses in France from 135 to 83, and ordered that they be coterminous with the new
départements of the civil organization. Each
département was authorized and ordered to elect its own bishop; the electors did not have to be Catholic, and that fact alone created a schism between the Constitutional Church and Constitutional Bishops and the Roman Catholic Church. Bishop Gaspard-Alexis Plan des Augiers protested, and then fled his diocese; he died in exile in Rome in 1794. On 21 February 1791, the Constitutional diocese of
Drôme elected François Marbos, curé of the parish of Bourg-lez-Valence as their 'bishop'. He was consecrated in Paris on 3 April 1791, by Jean Baptiste Gobel of Paris, assisted by Bishops Mirodot and Gouttes. After the
Concordat of 1801 he retracted his errors, and died in communion with Rome in 1825. ==Bishops==