APOTACTITÆ, or ΑΠΟΤΑΚΤΙΚΙ, an ancient sect, who affecting to follow the evangelical counsels of poverty, and the examples of the apostles and primitive Christians, renounced all their effects and possessions. It does not appear that they gave into any errors during their first state; some ecclesiastical writers assure us they had divers holy virgins and martyrs under the persecution of Diocletian in the fourth century; but they afterwards fell into the opinions of the Encratite, and taught that the renouncing of all riches was not only a matter of counsel and advice, but of precept and necessity. And hence the sixth law in the Theodosian code joins the Apotactitæ with the Eunomians and Arians.