Nicephorus

• a Roman surname, Cic. Q. Fr. 3, 1, 2, § 4; Inscr. Murat. 83, 3.

(Νικηφόρος). (1) Callistus Xanthopūlus, the author of an ecclesiastical history, was born in the latter part of the thirteenth century, and died about 1450. His ecclesiastical history was originally in twenty-three books, of which there are eighteen extant, extending from the birth of Christ down to the death of the tyrant Phocas, in 610. Although Nicephorus compiled from the works of his predecessors, he entirely remodelled his materials, and his style is vastly superior to that of his contemporaries.

(2) Gregŏras, q. v.

(3) Patriarcha, originally the notary or chief secretary of state to the emperor Constantine V. Copronymus, subsequently retired into a convent, and was raised to the patriarchate of Constantinople in 806. He was deposed in 815, and died in 828. Several of his works have come down to us, of which the most important is entitled Breviarium Historicum, a Byzantine history, extending from 602 to 770, and one of the best works of the Byzantine period. It is edited by Gedner (1832).