Editing Nikephoros Kallistos Xanthopoulos (section)

== Work ==
=== ''Ecclesiastica Historia'' ===
Xanthopoulos' 23-volume ''Ecclesiastica'' ''Historia'' ({{langx|el|Εκκλησιαστική Ιστορία}}; "Church History"), of which only the first eighteen volumes survive, starts the historical narrative from the time of [[Jesus|Christ]] and continues until the execution of the emperor [[Phocas|Phokas]] in 610.{{Sfn|Neville|2018|p=260}} The work includes descriptions of secular events, such as the accession of emperors and military campaigns, but emphasizes [[Ecumenical council|ecumenical councils]], doctrinal disputes, and the four eastern [[Patriarchate|patriarchates]].{{Sfn|Kazhdan|1991|p=2207}} 

Xanthopoulos began his project around 1310 using the basilica's manuscript library, and he completed it sometime after 1317.{{Sfn|Neville|2018|p=260}} For the first four centuries, the author is largely dependent on his predecessors, [[Eusebius of Caesarea|Eusebius]], [[Socrates Scholasticus]], [[Sozomen]], [[Theodoret]] and [[Evagrius Scholasticus|Evagrius]], his additions showing very little critical faculty. Also relied heavily on a collection of church histories in the [[Codex Baroccianus|Baroccianus]] Graecus 142, which contains the histories of Sozomen, Evagrios, and a variety of other excerpts on church history.{{sfn|Neville|2018|pp=260–265}} Among the comments and notes that were added by Xanthopoulos, the book contains the phrase ''{{Lang|grc|Κύριε βοήθει τῶ δούλω Νικοφόρω Καλλίστω}}'' ("Lord help your slave Nikephoros Kallistos"), which served as both a prayer and a signature.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wilson |first=Nigel |date=1974 |title=The Autograph of Nicephorus Callistus Xanthopoulos |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23958415 |journal=The Journal of Theological Studies |volume=25 |issue=2 |pages=437–442 |jstor=23958415 |issn=0022-5185}}</ref> The work was dedicated to the emperor [[Andronikos II Palaiologos|Andronicus II Palaeologus]] and it contributed to the monarch’s nationalist movement exalting Greek culture and [[Greek Orthodox Church|Orthodoxy]] above [[Latin Church|Latin Christianity]].<ref name=":0" /> His later work, which is based upon documents now no longer extant, is much more valuable.<ref name="EB1911" /> 

A table of contents of another five books, continuing the history to the death of [[Leo VI the Wise]] in 911, also exists, but whether the books were ever actually written is doubtful. Some modern scholars think that Nicephorus appropriated and passed off as his own the work of an unknown author of the 10th century. The plan of the work is good and, in spite of its fables and superstitious absurdities, contains important facts which would otherwise have been unknown.<ref name="EB1911" />

Only one manuscript of the history is known. It was stolen by a Turkish soldier from the library at [[Buda]] during the reign of [[Matthias Corvinus]] of [[Hungary]] and taken to [[Constantinople]], where it was bought by a [[Christians|Christian]] and eventually reached the imperial library at [[Vienna]].<ref name="EB1911" /><ref>For this history and events leading up to the first modern editions of the book, see [[Franco Mormando]], "Nicephorus and the Battle of the Books Between Catholics and Protestants" in his essay, "Pestilence, Apostasy and Heresy in Seventeenth-Century Rome," in ''Piety and Plague: From Byzantium to the Baroque,'' ed. F. Mormando and T. Worcester, Kirksville: Truman State University Press, 2007, pp. 265–71.</ref>

=== Other ===
Among Xanthopoulos' other works are commentaries on the writings of the patristic Greek theologian [[Gregory of Nazianzus]] and of the Byzantine monk [[John Climacus]].<ref name=":0" /> He was also the author of lists of the emperors and patriarchs of Constantinople, of a poem on the capture of [[Jerusalem]], and of a synopsis of the Scriptures, all in [[Iamb (foot)|iambics]]; and of commentaries on liturgical poems.<ref name="EB1911" /> As a [[Hagiography|hagiographer]], his writings include a history of miracles that occurred at the shrine of [[Church of St. Mary of the Spring (Istanbul)|Zoödochos Pege]], as well as the lives of Saint [[Saint Nicholas|Nicholas of Myra]] and Euphrosyne the Younger.{{Sfn|Kazhdan|1991|p=2207}} He also wrote many of the [[synaxarion|synaxaria]] in use in the [[Eastern Orthodox Church]].