What is "melitene"

The city of Melitene (modern Malatya) was an archdiocese of the Syrian Orthodox Church, attested between the ninth and thirteenth centuries but probably founded as early as the seventh century. More than thirty Syrian Orthodox bishops or metropolitans of Melitene are mentioned either by Michael the Syrian or in other Syrian Orthodox narrative sources. The archdiocese is last mentioned towards the end of the twelfth century, and seems to have lapsed in the early decades of the thirteenth century.