Peter (correspondent of Nilus of Ancyra)

Peter is known only as a correspondent of the ascetic writer Nilus of Ancyra (d. c. 430), who addresses seven surviving letters to him. The letters identify him both as a lector or reader (anagnostes) and as a monk, and Nilus writes to him throughout as a junior ascetic in need of spiritual direction: he counsels Peter not to be disturbed when demonic lust afflicts him after excessive fasting, urges perseverance in prayer against the devil's discouragements, and exhorts him to constant study of Scripture, psalmody, and the practice of righteousness, framing the monastic life as warfare against the demons. He appears to have been active in the early-fifth-century milieu around Ancyra (modern Ankara) in Galatia, as context follows from his being one of Nilus's correspondents. Beyond these letters of spiritual counsel he is otherwise unattested, and no biographical details, dates, or further career can be established for him.