was bishop of Bayeux during the 6th century. A local legend found in 15th-century
breviaries calls
St. Exuperius an immediate disciple of
Pope Clement I (88 to 99 CE), and the first Bishop of Bayeux. His see would according to this therefore have been founded in the 1st century.
Regnobert of Bayeux, the same legend tells us, succeeded St. Exuperius. But neither the
Bollandists,
Jules Lair, nor Louis Duchesne found no basis for this legend; it was only towards the end of the 4th century or beginning of the 5th century that Exuperius might have founded the See of Bayeux. Some successors of St. Exuperius were honored as saints: • Referendus, Rufinianus, and Lupus (about 465) •
Saint Vigor (early 6th century) destroyed a pagan temple, then still in use • Regnobert of Bayeux (about 629) founded many churches and the legend anachronistically calls him the first successor of Exuperius •
Hugues (d. 730) was simultaneously bishop of two other sees, Paris and Rouen.
Odo of Bayeux (1050–97), brother of
William the Conqueror, built the cathedral and was present at the
Battle of Hastings. He was imprisoned in 1082 for attempting to lead an expedition to Italy to overthrow
Pope Gregory VII, and died as a crusader in Sicily. Cardinal
Agostino Trivulzio (1531–48),
papal legate in the
Roman Campagna, was trapped in the
Castel Sant'Angelo during the siege and pillage of Rome by the Imperial forces led by the
Constable de Bourbon.
Arnaud Cardinal d'Ossat (1602–04) was a prominent diplomat identified with the second conversion of
Henry IV of France from Protestantism to Catholicism.
Claude Fauchet, former court
religieux to
Louis XVI, became one of the "conquerors" of the Bastille. He was chosen
Constitutional Bishop of Bayeux in 1791, and beheaded 31 October 1793.
Léon-Adolphe Amette,
Archbishop of Paris was, until 1905, Bishop of Bayeux. A council at
Caen in 1042, summoned by Duke William ('the Conqueror') and the bishops of Normandy, proclaimed the
Truce of God, not for the first time. In 1061 a council was again summoned by Duke William, who commanded the attendance of both clergy and laity (bishops, abbots, political and military leaders). The statutes of a synod held at Bayeux about 1300 furnish a very fair idea of the discipline of the time. In the Diocese of Bayeux are the
Abbey of St. Stephen (Abbaye-aux-Hommes) and the
Abbey of the Holy Trinity (Abbaye-aux-Dames), both founded at Caen by William the Conqueror (1029–87) and his wife
Matilda of Flanders in expiation of their unlawful marriage. The
Abbey of Saint-Étienne was first governed by
Lanfranc (1066–1070), who afterwards became
Archbishop of Canterbury. Other abbeys were those of
Troarn of which
Durand of Troarn, the successful opponent of
Berengarius, was abbot in the 11th century; and the Abbaye du Val, of which
Armand-Jean de Rancé (1626–1700) was abbot, in 1661, prior to his reform of
La Trappe Abbey. The
Abbey of St. Evroul (Ebrulphus) in the Diocese of Lisieux, founded about 560 by Bayeux native
St. Evroul, was the home of chronicler
Ordericus Vitalis (1075–1141). Bishop
Guillaume Bonnet founded the Collège de Bayeux in Paris in 1308 to house students from the dioceses of Bayeux, Le Mans, and Angers studying medicine or civil law. In 1641
Saint Jean Eudes founded the
Congregation of Notre Dame de Charité du Refuge, devoted to the protection of reformed prostitutes. The mission of the nuns later expanded to include other services to girls and women, including education. In 1900 the Order included 33 establishments in France and elsewhere, each an independent entity. At Tilly in the Diocese of Bayeux, Michel Vingtras established, in 1839, the politico-religious society known as La Miséricorde in connexion with the survivors of La Petite Eglise, condemned in 1843 by
Gregory XVI.
Daniel Huet, the famous savant (1630–1721) and
Bishop of Avranches, was a native of Caen. Bishop
François II de Nesmond authorized the establishment of the
Congregation of the Mission of Saint-Lazare in the diocese of Bayeux in 1682. During World War I, the diocese of Bayeux sent 260 priests and 75 seminarians into military service. Seventeen priests and sixteen seminarians died. In c. 1920 there were 716 parishes in the diocese. ==Bishops==