ACEPHALI, or ACEPHALITÆ, a term applied to several sects who refused to follow some noted leader. Thus the persons who refused to follow either John of Antioch, or St Cyril, in a dispute that happened in the council of Ephesus, were termed Accephali, without a head or leader. Such bishops, also, as were exempt from the jurisdiction and discipline of their patriarch, were styled Accephali.