Danilo Šćepčević

Danilo I
Metropolitan of Cetinje
Illustration from The Mountain Wreath, 1847
Native name	Данило I
Church	Serbian Orthodox Church
See	Skenderija and Primorje
Elected	1696
In office	1696–1735
Predecessor	Savatije
Successor	Sava Petrović
Orders
Ordination	June 1700 by Arsenije III
Personal details
Born	1670 Njeguši, Montenegro, Ottoman Empire
Died	January 11, 1735 Podmaine monastery, Republic of Venice
Buried	Podmaine monastery
Denomination	Eastern Orthodoxy
Residence	Cetinje
Coat of arms

Danilo Šćepčević (Serbian Cyrillic: Данило Шћепчевић, 1670 – January 11, 1735) was the Metropolitan of Cetinje between 1696 and 1735. He styled himself "vojevodič srpskoj zemlji" ("duke of the Serb land").

Danilo Šćepčević was born in Njeguši to father Stepan (hence "Šćepčević") and mother Ana. His family belonged to the Heraković brotherhood. He was known by the surname Šćepčević, while Petrović (Петровић) was only used later; he never called himself Petrović – it was first used by his nephews Sava and Vasilije, after a progenitor of the Petrović-Njegoš, Radul, known by his monastic name Petar, or after their father, Petar. He signed himself Danilo Šćepčev Heraković Njeguš (Данило Шћепчев Хераковић Његуш). Danilo had a brother, Radul, known as Rade Šćepčev.

As a fifteen-year-old, he was a witness to the battle of Vrtijeljka (1685). It is possible that he heard the details of the battle from some survivor. He mentioned "noble and famous hajduks who fell at Vrtijeljka" in a letter to the Montenegrin chiefs dated to 1714.

In 1696, the Montenegrin tribal assembly chose Danilo Šćepčević as the head of the Serbian Orthodox Metropolitanate of Cetinje, following the Great Migrations of the Serbs which left the seat of the Serbian Church to Phanariote Greeks who were closely associated with the Porte. Danilo was, as other Serbian bishops, unwilling to subordinate himself to Kalinik I, the new Patriarch of Peć.

In 1700, he chose not attend an assembly dedicated to Kalinik in Peć, but instead went to Dunaszekcső (Sečuj), in Habsburg Hungary, at the assembly of the Serbian Patriarch in exile, Arsenije III. Danilo was chirotonized by Arsenije III as the bishop of Cetinje and Metropolitan of Skenderija and Primorje. The chirotony, which took place during the national-church assembly, was participated by Serbian metropolitans from all over the Serbian lands, as well as other notable Serbs. It is likely that Danilo had met Arsenije III earlier when Arsenije was in Cetinje in 1689, asking the Montenegrins to take up arms and unite, to organize a fight against the Ottomans.