Barca (ancient city)

This article is about a city or area in eastern present-day Libya during its Greek and Roman antiquities. For Cyrenaica, also known as Barqah during its Islamic, Ottoman or subsequent eras, see Cyrenaica. For the football club "Barça", see FC Barcelona. For all other uses see Barca (disambiguation). See also Barce, Poland.

Barce (sometimes Barca) (Greek: Βάρκη, Arabic: برقة) was an ancient Greek colony and later Roman, Byzantine, city in North Africa. It occupied the coastal area of what is modern day Libya. As a Greek city it was part of the Cyrenaican Pentapolis along with the city of Cyrene itself. It should not be confused with "Barca" or "Barqah", which are alternative names for the former state and province of Cyrenaica.

According to most archeologists, it was situated at Al Marj, but according to Alexander Graham at Tolmeitha (Ptolemais).

History

Christianity spread to the Pentapolis of North Africa from Egypt. Synesius of Cyrene (370-414), bishop of Ptolemais, received his instruction at Alexandria in both the Catechetical School and the Museion, and he entertained a great deal of reverence and affection for Hypatia, the last pagan Neoplatonists, whose classes he had attended. Synesius was raised to the episcopate by Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, in 410 A.D. Since the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D., Cyrenaica had been recognized as an ecclesiastical province of the See of Alexandria, in accordance with the ruling of the Nicaean Fathers. The patriarch of the Coptic Church to his day includes the Pentapolis in his title as an area within his jurisdiction..

After often being destroyed and then restored, during the Roman period it became a mere borough but was, nevertheless, the site of a bishopric. Its bishop, Zopyros, was present at the First Council of Nicaea in 325. The subscriptions at Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451) give the names of two other bishops, Zenobius and Theodorus.

Barce was part of the Exarchate of Africa until it was conquered by the Arabs in AD 643-644 during the Islamic conquest of North Africa. It originally served as the capital of the Barqah province of the Caliphate. When the Ottoman Turks conquered the region in 1521 they used the Turkish form "Barka" for the province, but did not retain the city's status as it's capital.

Barca is now a Roman Catholic titular see of Cyrenaica in Libya, Northern Africa, but vacant. The Eparchy of the Western Pentapolis was part of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria as the Pope of Alexandria was the Pope of Africa, the most senior position in The Holy Synod of the Coptic Orthodox Church after the Pope was the Metropolitan of Western Pentapolis, but since its demise in the days of Pope John VI of Alexandria as a major Archiepiscopal Metropolis and now being held as a Titular See attached to another Diocese.

The modern city on the same site, Al Marj, grew up around a 19th century Turkish fort. It was developed by the Italians during their colonial dominance of Libya and today has a population of 120,000. The Italian settlement was severely damaged in a 1963 earthquake and is now largely abandoned. No remains of the ancient settlement are visible, but some of the finds made during the Italian period are on display in the museum at nearby Ptolemais.

Sources and references

• Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Barca" . Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
• GigaCatholic- Titular sees
• Butler, The Arab Conquest of Egypt, p. 430
• Heinrich Gelzer, Patrum Nicaenorum nomina, p. 231
• Marquardt, Staatsverwaltung, I, p. 459
• Westermann, Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte (in German)