maphrian

Updated: May 8, 2025

In 1237 the prior of the Dominicans in Jerusalem reported to Gregory IX that the Maphrian of the Jacobites, a kind of lesser patriarch, had acknowledged the supremacy of Rome; but a submission given from stress of circumstances carried no permanent weight; and subsequent correspondence between Innocent IV and officials of both churches seems to have been wilfully misunderstood at Rome.

D. J. (Dudley Julius) Medley - The Church and the Empire, Being an Outline of the History of the Church from A.D. 1003 to A.D. 1304

Under the patriarch and the maphrian, one hundred and fifty archbishops and bishops have been counted in the different ages of the Jacobite church; but the order of the hierarchy is relaxed or dissolved, and the greater part of their dioceses is confined to the neighborhood of the Euphrates and the Tigris.

Edward Gibbon - History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 4

The secondary, though honorable, place is filled by the maphrian, who, in his station at Mosul itself, defies the Nestorian catholic with whom he contests the primacy of the East.

Edward Gibbon - History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 4