Danilo I Petrović-Njegoš (; 1670 – 11 January 1735) was the Metropolitan of Cetinje between 1697 and 1735, and the founder of the House of Petrović-Njegoš, which ruled Montenegro from 1697 to 1918. He was also known by the patronymic Danilo Šćepčević. Early life and background Danilo Šćepčević was born in Njeguši, the son of Stepan or Šćepan Kaluđerović, a merchant, and Ana, who later became a nun. He had a brother, Radul, known as Rade Šćepčev. His paternal family belonged to the Heraković brotherhood. As a fifteen-year-old, he was a witness to the battle of Vrtijeljka (1685). It is possible that he heard the details of the battle from some survivor. He mentioned "noble and famous hajduks who fell at Vrtijeljka" in a letter to the Montenegrin chiefs dated to 1714. After the death of Sava Očinić, the Metropolitan of Cetinje, in 1697, there was turmoil surrounding the election of a new metropolitan. Chirotony In 1697, the Montenegrin tribal assembly chose Danilo Šćepčević as the head of the Serbian Orthodox Metropolitanate of Cetinje, following the Great Migrations of the Serbs which left the seat of the Serbian Church to Phanariote Greeks who were closely associated with the Porte. Danilo was, as other Serbian bishops, unwilling to subordinate himself to Kalinik I, the new Patriarch of Peć. In 1700, he chose not attend an assembly dedicated to Kalinik in Peć, but instead went to Dunaszekcső (Sečuj), in Habsburg Hungary, at the assembly of the Serbian Patriarch in exile, Arsenije III. Danilo was chirotonized by Arsenije III as the bishop of Cetinje and Metropolitan of Skenderija and Primorje. The chirotony, which took place during the national-church assembly, was participated by Serbian metropolitans from all over the Serbian lands, as well as other notable Serbs. It is likely that Danilo had met Arsenije III earlier when Arsenije was in Cetinje in 1689, asking the Montenegrins to take up arms and unite, to organize a fight against the Ottomans. Tenure He coordinated defense operations and partially settled tribal disputes among his people. An uprising broke out in 1711, after calls by Danilo, where the Montenegrins fought alongside Highlanders and Herzegovinians against local Ottomans. During his rule political ties between Russia and Montenegro were first established. Russian historian Pavel Rovinsky, in writing about Montenegrin-Russian relations, concluded that it was the pretensions of Turkey and Austria (and at times the Republic of Venice) that turned