Letters

Nilus

(Νεῖλος), or NEILUS, the name of several Byzantine writers. A full account of them is given by Leo Allatius, Diatribe de Nilis et eorum Scriptis, in the edition of the letters of Nilus [see below, No. 1], Rome, 1688, and by Harless (Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. x. p. 3, &c.), to which writers we must refer for further particulars and authorities. It is only the most important of them, and the chief facts connected with them that can be mentioned here.

Nilus

1. ASCETA ET MONACHUS (and Saint), lived in the fifth century of the Christian aera.

Saxius places him about the year A. D. 420. He was descended from a noble family in Constantinople, and was eventually raised to the dignity of eparch, or governor of his native city; but being penetrated, we are told, with a deep feeling of the reality of divine things, he renounced his rank and dignities, and retired with his son Theodulus to a monastery on Mount Sinai, while his wife and daughter took refuge in a religious retreat in Egypt. His son is said to have perished in an attack made upon the convent by some barbarians; but Nilus himself escaped, and appears to have died about A. D. 450 or 451.

Works

Nilus was the author of many theological works, several of which have been printed, though they have not vet been collected into one edition. Photius gives extracts from some of his works. (Bibl. Cod. 276.)

Of the various works of Nilus the most important are,

1. Κεφαλαια ἢ Παραινέσεις

containing advice on the way in which a Christian should live; in fact, a summary of practical divinity.

2. Letters

for the most part on the same subject as the preceding work.

3. Ἐπικτήτου ἐγχειρίδιον

In this the Manual of Epictetus, as given by Arrian, is accommodated to the use of Christians.

Editions

This manual, which appears in the edition of Suaresius mentioned above, is also published in the fifth volume of Schweighäuser's Epictetus, Lips. 1800.

Editions

Some of the works of Nilus were first published in Latin by P. F. Zinus, Venet. 1557, 8vo.Next some other works of Nilus, which had not been printed in the above-mentioned edition, were published by Possinus, Paris, 1639, 4to.; but the best edition of his miscellaneous works is that of Suaresins, entitled S. Nili Tractatus seu Opuscula Rome, 1673, fol.

The letters of Nilus, which are very numerous, being more than three hundred, were first published by Possinus, Paris, 1657, 4to.; but a better edition is the one published at Rome, 1668, fol., with the Latin version of Leo Allatius.

Further Information

Phot. l.c.; Niceph. H. E. 14.54; Allatius, Fabric. ll. cc.; Cave, Hist. Lit. vol. i. p. 428; Tillemont, Me/m. de l'Hist. Eccl. vol. xiv. p. 189.

Nilus

2. CABASILAS. [CABASILAS.]

Nilus

3. Of RHODES, of which he was metropolitan, about A. D. 1360. He is stated, however, to have been a native of Chios.

Works

History of the Nine Oecumenical Councils

He was the author of several works, of which the most important was a short history of the nine oecumenical councils.

Editions

This was published by H. Justellus as an appendix to the Nomocanon of Photius, Paris, 1615, 4to.; by Voellius and Justellus in Bibl. Juris Canonici, 1661, fol. vol. ii. p. 1155; and by Harduinus, Concilia, vol. v. p. 1479.

Grammatical works

Nilus also wrote some grammatical works, of which an account is given by F. Passow, De Nilo, grammatico adhuc ignoto, ejusque grammatica aliisque grammaticis Scriptis, Vratisl. 1831-32, 4to.

NilusSCHOLASTICUS

4. SCHOLASTICUS, of whom we know nothing, except that he is the author of an epigram in the Greek Anthology (vol. iii. p. 235, ed. Jacobs; Brunck, Anal. iii. p. 14).

Nilus

physician. [NILEUS].