In the rest of the history of Christianity, a few other patriarchates were gradually recognised by any of these above ancient episcopal sees. With time, eventually some of them fell due to military occupations following the Islamic conquests of the Middle East and North Africa, and became titular or honorary patriarchates with no actual institutional jurisdiction on the original site.
As Christianity expanded in the Roman Empire, larger concentrations of believers were to be found in urban environments. The Bishop of such cities came to hold a pre-eminence of honour in the province of which his diocese was the capital, with some eventually gaining a primacy even over other provinces with their own primus inter pares. The Council of Nicea codified this arrangement into canon law in accordance with the growing standardization of ecclesiastical diocesan structure along the lines of secular Roman blueprints. It also gave the first documented use of the term "Metropolitan" in reference to such bishops as had the presidency over a province. Meanwhile Rome, Alexandria and Antioch had grown in ecclesiastical prominence such that by the early 4th century they had long-recognized jurisdiction over more than one province of bishops each. Alexandria had attained primacy over Roman Egypt, Roman Libya, and Pentapolis. Rome had Primatial authority over provinces within 100 miles of the city.[3] By virtue of their authority over multiple provinces, the Sees of Rome Alexandria and Antioch were by this time already exercising "supra-metropolitan" jurisdiction resembling that which would later become known as Patriarchates.[3] All provinces of Italy were under the broader Primatial oversight of the Archbishop of Rome by the end of the 4th century.[4]
With the Imperial Capital having moved to Byzantium in 330, the re-named city of Constantinople became increasingly important in church affairs of the Greek East. The See of Constantinople was granted Archiepiscopal status prior to a council held in the city in 381, which ranked it second in honour after Rome. Archbishop Atticus would do much to expand the jurisdictional reach of the See in the early 5th century.[5] Following the Council of Ephesus in 431, Bishop Juvenal of Jerusalem began to exert jurisdictional oversight across all three provinces of Roman Palestine, seeking to make Jerusalem into a Metropolitan See, but Cyril of Alexandria and Pope Leo I opposed the separation of Jerusalem from suffrage to Cæsarea and, more broadly, Antioch.[6] Juvenal went as far as to claim Metropolitan authority over Roman Arabia and Phoenicia. At the Council of Chalcedon negotiations with Archbishop Maximus of Antioch resulted in approval of oversight over all of Palestine but no further. The attendees of the council, which included the bishops of Palestine, thus consented to the establishment of the Metropolitinate of Jerusalem. The extent of the oversight granted to the jurisdiction at Chalcedon was both a significant expansion on the precedent established at Nicea and was supra-Metropolitan in scale alongside Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria and Antioch.[7] In light of this, a century later Emperor Justinian would recognise Jerusalem as one of five Patriarchates.
The four Eastern Orthodox patriarchates (Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem), along with their Latin Catholic counterpart in the West, Rome, are distinguished as "senior" (Greek: πρεσβυγενή, presbygenē, "senior-born") or "ancient" (παλαίφατα, palèphata, "of ancient fame") and are among the apostolic sees, traditionally having had one of the apostles or evangelists as their first bishop: Andrew, Mark, Peter, James, and Peter again, respectively. In the case of Constantinople, Andrew is said to have visited the city of Byzantium in 38 AD (not Constantinople, as the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great had not yet declared Constantinople in 330 AD as the new capital of the Eastern Roman Empire on the grounds of the former city of Byzantium). According to tradition, Andrew appointed the bishop Stachys the Apostle who remained bishop in Byzantium until 54 AD. Therefore in the case of Constantinople the apostolic see is the See of Byzantium.
There are also four major archbishops, who operate as patriarch of their autonomous church, but for historical or procedural reasons are not recognized as a full patriarch. The main difference being that a patriarch's election is communicated to the pope, as a sign of communion between equals, but a major archbishop's election must be approved by the pope.
In addition, there are four titular patriarchates - diocesan bishops whose dioceses have been given the honorific title of patriarchate for various historical reasons, but are not heads of autonomous churches sui iuris. These include the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, of Lisbon, Venice and the East Indies.
