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Tota (bishop)

Bishop of Selsey

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 14, 2026
Entity authorityQ7827928 ↗
Source-derived summary

Tota was a Bishop of Selsey when Sussex was being ruled by Offa of Mercia.

Not very much is known of Tota but he is recorded as present at a church council (Synod of Calcuthiens) attended by papal legates in 786. He was consecrated between 781 and 786.

Tota died between 786 and 789.

Notes

Citations

References

Fryde, E. B.; Greenway, D. E.; Porter, S.; Roy, I. (1996). Handbook of British Chronology (Third revised ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-56350-X.

Heron-Allen, Edward (1911). Selsey Bill. Historic and Prehistoric.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Tota (bishop)” is bishop of Selsey. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Tota, bishop and Bishop, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1996, 1911—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 0800-01-01. For this dossier, Tota, bishop and Bishop is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “bishop of Selsey” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7827928. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1996 and 1911.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Tota (bishop)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Tota (bishop) primary sources, Tota (bishop) archive and Tota research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Tota (bishop)”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Tota (bishop)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.