Nikolaos of Otranto

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Nikolaos von Otranto (also: Abbot Nektarios von Casole ) (* approx. 1155/60 in Otranto ; † February 9, 1235 in the monastery of San Nicola di Casole ) was a Greek monastery leader and writer.

Life

Nikolaos was probably born around 1155/60. It is not known where he received his considerable education, but it was possibly the monastery of San Nicola di Casole , only a few kilometers from Otranto , a very important center of Greek education in Apulia . In any case, he himself became a priest monk of this monastery at the latest in 1205 , after having been a lay teacher of Greek in his native city. Since he mastered Latin and Greek, he served Cardinal Benedict of Santa Susanna in 1205/7 and Cardinal Pelagius von Albano in 1214/5 on their travels to the Latin Empire of Constantinople as an interpreter in discussions about the Church Union. With a diplomatic embassy from Emperor Frederick II , he traveled to the Byzantine imperial court in Nikaia in 1223/4 , as a representative of the Greek churches of Apulia in 1232 to the papal curia .

Nikolaos translated several, mostly liturgical , texts from Greek into Latin and vice versa, including the Basileios liturgy and the liturgy declaration of the Patriarch Germanos I of Constantinople . He also wrote his own writings, including a. Poems and letters.

Major works

  • The “Art of the Chisel”, a collection on various methods of fortune-telling, which Nikolaos translated into Greek from a Latin version of originally Arabic sources and provided with a foreword on the limits of fortune-telling in Christianity.
  • Three “Syntagmata” in Greek and Latin against the Latins with several addenda. In particular, Nikolaos turns against the filioque , the azymes and various liturgical and disciplinary deviations.
  • The "disputation against the Jews". This is a fictitious dialogue in this form, which is supposedly based on real disputes between the author and Jews. This writing is on the one hand the most extensive and most learned work of Nikolaos, on the other hand it is one of the most extensive Byzantine writings of this genre.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Λατίνοι και Ορθόδοξοι στη Magna Graecia του 13ου αιώνα. Retrieved March 27, 2018 .
personal data
SURNAME Nikolaos of Otranto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Nektarios of Casole
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek monastery leader and writer
DATE OF BIRTH around 1155
PLACE OF BIRTH Otranto
DATE OF DEATH February 9, 1235
Place of death San Nicola di Casole near Otranto