Nitiiaii Manuscript (Codex Nitriexsis, des- ignated as K of the Gospels, No. 17,211 of the Additions in the British Museum) is a valuable palimpsest frag- ment of the N. T. in uncials not later than the 0th cen- tury, written over by a Syriac translation of the Mono- physite treatise of Severus of Antioch against Gram- maticus. It was brought home by Dr. Cnreton from the Nitrian monastery of St. Mary in the desert north- west of Cairo. It contains only twenty-five portions of Luke's Gospel on forty-five leaves, in two cohmms of about twenty-five lines to a page. The ancient letters
IV.'—^
^ \
NITSCHMANN"
139
KITZSCH
are very faint, but tliey have been deciphered and transcribed bj* Tischendorf and Trcgelles. the former of whom has published an edition of them (in his Monu- menta sacra Inedila, vol. ii). The letters are bold, and of the ancient form. The Ammonian sections stand in the margin ; but the Eusebian canons, if once there, are now effaced. — Tregelles, in Home's Introd. iv, 183; Scrivener, Introd. p. 114. See Manuscripts, Bibi-ical.
Nitschmann, Anna, daughter of David Nitsch- mann, sen., a distinguished deaconess of the Moravian Church, was born Nov. 24, 1715, in Moravia; died May 21, 17C0, at Hcrrnhut, in Saxon}-. From her fourteenth year she devoted herself to the service of God among her own sex with great earnestness and zeal, laboring in Germany, France, England, and America. She was possessed of extraordinary gifts, and composed many beautiful hymns which are still in use iu the Moravian Church. (E, de S.)
Nitschmann, David, the first bishop of the Re- newed Moravian Church (q. v.), was born Dec. 27, 1696, at Zauchtenthal, in Moravia. At the age of twenty-seven years he tied to Ilerrnhut, in Saxony, and took an active part iu the renewal of the Church, laboring at the same time as one of its itinerant evan- gelists. In this capacity he visited his native country, Bohemia, various parts of Germany, England, and Den- mark. At Copenhagen he became acquainted with Anthony, a slave from the West Indies. The account which this man gave him of the heathen ignorance of the negroes in those islands excited his liveliest sym- pathy, and led to the inauguration of the extensive and well-known missionary work of the Moravian Church. On Aug. 21, 1732, Nitschmann and Leonhard Dober (q. V.) set out for St. Thomas, determined to sell them- selves as slaves, if there were no other way of reaching the negroes. After his return to Europe Nitschmann was elected bishop, to which office bishop Daniel Ernst Jablonski (q. v.) consecrated him, March 13, 1735, at Berlin, thus transferring the episcopal succession of the Ancient Moravian Church (q. v.) to the Renewed. In the same year Nitschmann sailed to Georgia with a colony of Moravian emigrants. Among his fellow- passengers were John and Charles Wesley. His piety, and especially the calmness which he and his brethren displayed in the midst of a terrible storm, made a deep impression upon the heart of the former, and prepared the way for an intercourse with the Moravians that culminated in the historic fellowship between him and Peter Boehler (q. v.). Nitschmann returned to Europe in 1736. The next twenty-five years of his life were spent mostly on episcopal journeys in many parts of the continent of Europe, in Great Britain, the West Indies, and America. He undertook not less than fifty sea voj'ages. His labors in America, where he spent altogether about twenty-three years, were particularly arduous and successful, both among white men and In- dians. He died October 5, 1772, at Bethlehem, Penn., which settlement he had founded in 1740. Zinzendorf says of him: "His conversion was genuine, his walk and conversation were simple, and his manners open- hearted. Over against the world, however, he bore himself with authority. His missionarj' spirit knew no rest, and his success in founding churches was extraor- dinary." See D. Nitschmann in einem kiirzen Uniriss dargestelh (Rothenburg, 1842) ; The Moravian, vol. vi (1861); Nachrichtm aus d. Briider- Gemeinde (1832).
(E. DE S.)
Nitschmann, John, a bishop of the Moravian Church (q. v.), was born at Schonau, in Moravia, in 1703. In 1723 he fled to Ilerrnhut, in Saxony, and took an active part in the renewal of the Church. He was consecrated to the episcopal office in 1741, and labored chiefly in America, 1749-1751 ; England, 1751- 1757; Middle Germany, 1757-1769; and Holland, 1769 to the time of his death. May 6, 1772. He was dis- tinguished by his great simplicity and sound judgment.
He had the gift of ruling the Church. As a preacher he was very pojudar. (E. de S.)