ABSTRACT
The incumbent bishop on Pope Gregory's election was Demetrius, who had himself only gained the episcopate in 588. In autumn 599 Pope Gregory informed the rector Romanus that it had been reported that Basilius' constant engagement in lawsuits was bringing his office into disrepute and so Romanus was to see to it that Basilius left Sicily within five days and returned to Rome. Gregory showed genuine concern for his health when in 601 it was reported that Marinianus of Ravenna was vomiting blood. Gregory's greatest patronage coup did not come in the Suburbicarian diocese at all, but in Ravenna, technically in the diocese of Italia Annonaria and therefore subject ecclesiastically to the archbishopric of Milan. By the time of Gregory, with the Lombards occupying northern Italy and Milanese jurisdiction limited to the coastal enclave of Liguria, the archbishopric of Ravenna had become more dependent on Rome, in ecclesiastical terms.
