an officer in the ancient church, concerning whose functions the learned are much divided. The word is formed from χορεύω, a region, or tract of country, and επίσκοπος, a bishop or overseer.

The Chorepiscopi were suffragan or local bishops, holding a middle rank between bishops and presbyters, and delegated to exercise episcopal jurisdiction within certain districts, when the boundaries of particular churches, over which separate bishops presided, were considerably enlarged. It is uncertain when this office was first introduced. Some trace it to the close of the first century; others tell us that chorepiscopi were not known in the East till the beginning of the fourth century, and in the West about the year 439. They ceased both in the East and West in the tenth century.