PETER COMESTOR. - Theologian, thus called perhaps because of the ardor with which he read books, b. probably at Troyes (Champagne) in the first half of the 12th century, d. at Paris in 1179. Dean of the Chapter of Troyes from 1147, in 1164 he became chancellor of Paris and until 1169 taught theology; in his last years he became a regular canon at St. Victor, where he was buried with the well-known epitaph composed by him: « Petrus eram quem petra tegit dictusque Comestor - nunc comedor. Vivus docui, nec cesso docere ».
His Historia scholastica (PL 198, 1053-1722), written between 1169 and 1173, is famous: the first essay of a sacred history, which goes from the earthly Paradise to the imprisonment of St. Paul at Rome, compiled on the basis of texts of Scripture and of the Fathers with synchronistic references to the profane history of the greatest peoples (Persians, Greeks, Romans); despite its gaps and its defects, it was for that time an original work, universally received as a classic text, and P., known also as Magister historiarum, was remembered by Dante (Paradiso, XII, 134) alongside Hugh of St. Victor and Peter of Spain. Notable are the Sententiae de Sacramentis (ed. by R. Martin, in Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense, fasc. XVII, Louvain 1937, in appendix, with valuable prolegomena), written between 1165 and 1170, in which the material is developed along the lines of Peter Lombard but with evident advances (broader documentation, more elaborate terminology, especially as regards the Eucharist), although it does not treat of Order and Matrimony. He is also the author of many Sermones, some of which (published among those of Hildebert of Lavardin: PL 171, 339-964) show the professorial tone of the theologian, while others (unpublished), composed in the quiet of St. Victor, are simpler and more attuned to the needs of the audience. His commentaries on St. Paul are still unpublished (Paris, Bibl. nat., lat. 15,269) and are brief theological glosses on the gloss of Anselm of Laon; his authorship of the Alleguriæ in Vetus et Novum Testamentum (of which the first part is published in PL 177, 194-284) is affirmed by Martin and contested by Landgraf. Also attributed to P. is the Liber qui dicitur Pancrisis (Bibl. of Avranches, 19; Troyes, 425 A): a collection of sententiae and quaestiones drawn from the Fathers and from contemporary theologians.
Bibliography7 works
Antonio Piolanti