Nicetas, David of Paphlagonia

NICETAS, DAVID OF PAPHLAGONIA. - This name occurs in the manuscripts to designate a Byzantine writer of the 9th-10th century, although already the ancient historians, such as Allacci in his diatribe de Nicetis, ask themselves whether it is a question of one or of two writers.

Generally the opinion prevailed of a single person, namely N. David, whom Loparev made bishop of Dadybra in Paphlagonia. Recently Vogt has maintained that a distinction must be made between N. of Paphlagonia, a disciple of Arethas of Caesarea and of Photius, with whom he rivaled in eloquence, who lived under Leo VI (886-912), and N. David, a politically active man whose activity was prolonged until the reign of Nicephorus Phocas, and who was distinguished for his aversion to Photius. Both the one and the other were laymen. This opinion, which the author promised to develop in the Corpus Bruxellense, seems to be regarded as the more probable.

N. David is the author of the biography of the patriarch St. Ignatius. The other writings would be the work of N. of Paphlagonia, namely the 20 panegyric orations published by Combefis, to which Vogt added two others in honor of the apostles Peter and Paul, the exegesis of the poems of St. Gregory of Nazianzus and perhaps also the commentary on St. Luke, of which brief fragments remain.

The biography of St. Ignatius is reproduced in PG 105, 488-573. In the same volume (15-488, 575-78), other writings are collected. The homilies on Sts. Peter and Paul are found in Orientalia Christiana Analecta (71 [1931], pp. 24-96).

Maurizio Gordillo