Xyphilin, John

, a patriarch of Constantinople in the eleventh century, was a native of Trebisond. He distinguished himself by his learning and piety, and was raised to the see of Constantinople in 1064. He died Aug. 2, 1075. There is a sermon of his in the Bibl. Patrum. Andrew Scottus and Vossius erroneously imagined him to be the abridger of Dion Cassius: but it was a nephew of his name, as that nephew says himself in the history of Augustus. This nephew made, about the end of the eleventh century, a compendium of the last forty-five books of Dion, which contain the history of the emperors to the time of Alexander son of Mammea. It is probable he did not abridge the first five and thirty books, since there remains no trace or testimony of it: and, besides, he assures us, that even in his time there wanted something of the history of Dion. As to what remains, he has been very exact and faithful in following the sense, and often the very words of his author, as may appear by comparing the abridgment with the original. It has been printed sometimes with Dion Cassius, and sometimes separately, particularly at Paris, 1592, fol. ²

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