Nikephoros I of Constantinople
| Saint Nikephoros of Constantinople | |
|---|---|
Nikephoros I of Constantinople trampling on John VII of Constantinople. Miniature from Chludov Psalter.
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| Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople | |
| Born | c. 758 Constantinople |
| Died | April 5, 828 Constantinople |
| Venerated in | Roman Catholic Church; Eastern Orthodox Church |
| Feast | 5 March |
St. Nikephoros I or Nicephorus I (Greek: Νικηφόρος Α΄, Nikēphoros I ), (c. 758 – April 5, 828) was a Christian Byzantine writer and Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople from April 12, 806, to March 13, 815.
He was born in Constantinople as the son of Theodore and Eudokia, of a strictly orthodox family, which had suffered from the earlier Iconoclasm. His father Theodore, one of the secretaries of Emperor Constantine V, had been scourged and banished to Nicaea for his zealous support of Iconodules, and the son inherited the religious convictions of the father. Nevertheless, he entered the service of the Empire, became cabinet secretary (asekretis), and under Irene took part in the synod of 787 as imperial commissioner. He then withdrew to one of the cloisters that he had founded on the eastern shore of the Bosporus, until he was appointed director of the largest home for the destitute in Constantinople c. 802.
After the death of the Patriarch Tarasios, although still a layman, he was chosen patriarch by the wish of the emperor (Easter, April 12, 806). The uncanonical choice met with opposition from the strictly clerical party of the Stoudites, and this opposition intensified into an open break when Nikephoros, in other respects a very rigid moralist, showed himself compliant to the will of the emperor by reinstating the excommunicated priest Joseph.
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