Orcistus

Orcistus was a city in Asia Minor, apparently in Phrygia.

History

It is only mentioned in Peutinger's Table. An inscription of 331 fixes the site at the modern Turkish Alikel Yaila, also called Alekian, in the Ottoman vilayet of Angora. It was then a station at the intersection of four roads and formed part of the "Diocese of Asia"; consequently it must have belonged to Phrygia. In 451 it was in Galatia Secunda or Galatia Salutaris, probably from the formation of that province about 386-95.

The name comes from a tribe called Orei, which dwelt in the plains on the eastern frontier of Phrygia.

Ecclesiastical history

Only three bishops are known: Domnus, at the Council of Ephesus in 431, Longinus, at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 and Segermas, at a Council of Constantinople in 692. But the see is mentioned by the Notitiæ episcopatuum until the thirteenth century among the suffragans of Pessinus.

Orcistus remains a Roman Catholic titular see in the former ecclesiastical province of Galatia Secunda.

References

• "Orcistus". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11276a.htm.