Patriarch Nephon II of Constantinople

Nephon II
Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople
Church	Church of Constantinople
In office	end 1486 – early 1488 summer 1497 – Aug 1498 spring 1502
Predecessor	Symeon I Maximus IV Joachim I
Successor	Dionysius I Joachim I Pachomius I
Personal details
Born	Peloponnese
Died	11 August 1508
Previous post	Metropolitan of Thessaloniki
Sainthood
Feast day	August 11
Venerated in	Eastern Orthodox Church

Nephon II or Nifon II, (Albanian: Nifoni; Greek: Νήφων Β΄), born Nicholas, was Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople three times: from 1486 to 1488, from 1497 to 1498 and for a short time in 1502. He is honored as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church and his feast day is August 11.

He was born in the Peloponnese peninsula in southern Greece, of mixed parentage, his mother being a noble Greek lady and his father an Albanian. He was tonsured a monk at Epidaurus, taking the religious name of Nephon. He was involved in calligraphy and copying manuscripts. He then followed a monk named Zacharias and settled in the Monastery of the Theotokos in Ohrid. When Zacharias was elected Archbishop of Ohrid, Nephon went to Mount Athos and there he was ordained a hieromonk. In 1482 he was elected Metropolitan of Thessaloniki and at the end of 1486 he was elected Patriarch of Constantinople, supported by the wealthy rulers of Wallachia, who thus made their entry in the history of external influences on the Patriarchate's election process.

After eighteen months a scandal arose, which led to Nephon's removal. Specifically, the previous Patriarch Symeon I died without making his will. İşkender Bey, one of the sons of Symeon's main sponsor, George Amiroutzes, had converted to Islam and was at the time the treasurer of the Sultan. He requested that all the inheritance of Symeon, which included also ecclesiastic items, should pass to the Sultan's treasury. To avoid this, Nephon pretended that a nephew of the deceased patriarch was the legitimate heir, finding three monks that bore false witness. After discovering the truth, the Sultan Bayezid II confiscated the property of Symeon, punished the clergy involved in the scandal, and exiled Nephon. Nephon was exiled to some island in the Black Sea off Sozopol and was deposed in the first months of 1488. According to scholar Steven Runciman, Nephon was a foolish and unsatisfactory Patriarch.

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