Archdiocese of Apamea

The Archdiocese of Apamea was an ecclesiastical province of the Catholic Church in the Principality of Antioch from around 1110 to 1149.

Diocese of Albara

Located on the plateau Jabal al-Sumaq, Albara was a strategically important town to the southeast of Antioch in the Middle Ages. The crusaders captured Antioch on 3 June 1098. Pope Urban II's legate, Bishop Adhemar of Le Puy, restored the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Antioch, John the Oxite, and confirmed the patriarch's authority over both the Greek and the Latin clergy. The crusaders' two most important leaders, Prince Bohemond I of Taranto and Count Raymond IV of Toulouse, wanted to secure the rule of Antioch for themselves. Raymond invaded the Jabal al-Smmaq and captured Albara on 25 September 1098.

Albara had not been an Orthodox episcopal see, but Raymond established a Latin bishopric in the town, which thus became the first Roman Catholic diocese in Syria. After consulting with his chaplains and commanders, Raymond appointed a Provençal priest, Peter of Narbonne, as the first bishop of Albara. Raymond's chaplain, Raymond of Aguilers, recorded that Raymond's troops "gave thanks to God" after Peter's appointment because "they wished to have a Roman bishop in the eastern church to look after their affairs". Historian Bernard Hamilton proposes that Peter was actually appointed for political and social reasons, because late-11th-century European rulers could not administer their realms without the assistance of high-ranking clergymen.