Within the depth-psychology adjacent corpus represented by the Seba library, Nicholas I appears almost exclusively as a figure of ecclesiastical-political history in Francis Dvornik’s exhaustive 1948 study of the Photian Schism. The term designates Pope Nicholas I (858–867), whose pontificate constitutes one of the pivotal axes around which Dvornik organises his revisionist historiography of the ninth-century rupture between Rome and Constantinople. The corpus does not treat Nicholas I as a psychological type or archetypal figure; rather, he functions as an institutional agent whose ideological ambitions — rooted in Gelasian and Leonine theories of papal primacy — drove the confrontation with Patriarch Photius and the Byzantine court. Dvornik’s signal contribution is to displace the image of Nicholas as principled doctrinal guardian and expose instead the political calculation, reactive anxiety, and personal dependence on informants like Theognostos that shaped his escalating campaign against Photius. The tensions foregrounded in the corpus turn on the gap between Nicholas’s claimed universalist jurisdiction and the actual limits of his influence over Frankish bishops, Germanic synods, and the Byzantine Emperor. Nicholas emerges, in Dvornik’s reading, as a papacy in overreach — fear and ambition intertwined — making him a figure of enduring relevance to any study of institutional authority, boundary-testing, and the dynamics of schismatic projection.
Nicholas, in defining the Popes’ supreme power, often quotes the words of Pope Gelasius I without mentioning his name; and he also made his own the theories of Leo I.
Dvornik argues that Nicholas I’s ideological innovations were substantially inherited from Gelasian and Leonine precedent rather than representing the radical doctrinal departure that legend has attributed to him.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948thesis
after losing Illyricum, he was now busy wasting the finest achievement Radoald and Zachary had brought from Constantinople — the recognition by the Byzantine Church of the Roman supremacy
Dvornik identifies the moment Nicholas I recognised that his aggressive posture had squandered a real diplomatic achievement, revealing the anxiety and tactical miscalculation underlying his escalating correspondence with Byzantium.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948thesis
it is also easy to guess who was responsible for this ‘progress’: none, of course, but Theognostos and his friends: and the Pope himself confessed as much
Dvornik demonstrates that Nicholas I’s hardening position against Photius was substantially shaped by partisan informants from Constantinople, undermining any picture of the Pope as a disinterested arbiter of canonical principle.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948thesis
what the Pope really wished from his heart was not so much a revision of the trial as the downfall, pure and simple, of Photius
Dvornik cuts through the juridical rhetoric of Nicholas I’s letters to expose a personal desire for Photius’s elimination that superseded any stated commitment to canonical process.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948thesis
the Pope bluntly stated that the Patriarch of Constantinople had in reality no right to call himself a Patriarch, since his see was not of apostolic origin.
Nicholas I’s denial of the patriarchal legitimacy of Constantinople is cited as an example of the provocative tone that deepened Byzantine resentment and undermined the prospects for reconciliation.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
Photius spoke of the Pope, until the Council of 867, as little as possible. I have already pointed out his efforts to obtain Nicholas’ recognition and his deliberate silence after Nicholas’ reiterated refusal.
Dvornik rehabilitates Photius by contrasting his restrained posture with Nicholas I’s repeated public rejections, reversing the traditional narrative of Photian aggression.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
these details may seem to us petty and insignificant to-day, but they should be read in the setting of the two documents — Photius’ encyclical letter to the Eastern bishops and Nicholas’ letter to Hincmar.
Dvornik contextualises the ritual grievances exchanged between Rome and Constantinople as symptomatic of the deeper national and jurisdictional wound that Nicholas I had inflicted on Byzantine pride.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
Hincmar often prefers to quote word for word the letters Nicholas had addressed to him… Nicholas I had requested the archbishop of Mainz, Liutbert, to summon a council of Germanic bishops
Dvornik traces how Nicholas I attempted to mobilise Western episcopal opinion against Byzantium through Hincmar of Rheims and the Germanic episcopate, with notably limited success.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
‘We have said and we repeat that we were received by Pope Nicholas as bishops, that we co-celebrated with him and that we were treated as such.’
Dvornik examines conflicting testimony about whether Nicholas I actually received Photian bishops to communion, a factual ambiguity that complicates the standard narrative of his consistent opposition to the Photian party.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
none of the violent passages that abound in Nicholas’ letters and in the Acts of the Council of 869 are even mentioned
Dvornik notes the significant restraint shown by later canonists in citing Nicholas I’s correspondence, suggesting that even reformist churchmen found his most aggressive formulations diplomatically inconvenient.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
there was in Nicholas’ correspondence a whole series of letters with particularly pointed statements about Photius’ condemnation. Is it not extraordinary then that the learned cardinal… should have omitted them?
Dvornik highlights Cardinal Deusdedit’s conspicuous silence on Nicholas I’s anti-Photian letters as evidence that the polemical excess of Nicholas’s correspondence embarrassed even his most committed successors.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
can it be seriously admitted that the Patriarch… wishing as he did to secure the assistance of the Latin episcopacy, expected to enlist its support by attacking the whole Western Church
Dvornik uses rhetorical argument to reject the contention that Photius’s encyclical constituted an assault on Western Christianity, indirectly exculpating him from the charge Nicholas I’s camp had levelled.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
Nicholas’ references to Greek attacks against the primacy are far too vague, as already stated, to justify the inference that Michael or Photius put forward such ideas
Dvornik deflates the evidentiary weight of Nicholas I’s own claims that Photius and Michael III had mounted a systematic theological assault on Roman primacy.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
there was no better test than the return of Illyricum to the direct jurisdiction of the Holy See… the Pope immediately proceeded to action.
Dvornik reveals that Nicholas I’s engagement with the Photian affair was inseparable from his territorial ambitions regarding Illyricum, anchoring the schism in geopolitical opportunism as much as ecclesiological principle.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
once restored to his see by the Pope, Ignatius would show himself more grateful to the papacy than his rival, and in this respect Theognostos had no doubt given the Pope more definite assurances
Dvornik exposes the transactional logic behind Nicholas I’s support for Ignatius: the Pope backed the exiled patriarch in expectation of greater deference to Rome, not out of principled canonical commitment.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948supporting
Boris was delighted every time the Pope’s gracious letter was read out to him. All his doubts were cleared and all the problems he had raised were solved
Dvornik notes the warmth of Bulgarian reception to Nicholas I’s pastoral correspondence as a contrasting register — pragmatic accommodation rather than confrontation — within the Pope’s Bulgarian mission.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948aside
the Pope appalled by the news just received about the stand taken by the Greeks… it is therefore evident that the Pope could not, in the document under consideration, refer to the Council of 867.
Dvornik uses chronological reconstruction to establish that Nicholas I’s state of alarm at Greek developments preceded the Council of 867, bearing on the dating and interpretation of his correspondence.
, The Photian Schism: History and Legend, 1948aside