Peter Comestor and Peter Lombard: Brothers in Deed

According to medieval legend, Gratian, Peter Lombard, and Peter Comestor were bro7thers. What united these men in the medieval imagination were the three great works they produced, respectively, over the course of the twelfth century: theDecretum, theSentences, and theHistoria scholastica. The two Peters, in particular, were connected. Stephen Langton, one of the most prominent teachers of Scripture and theology at Paris during the last decades of the twelfth century, praised both Peters for their mastery of Sacred Scripture. The joint ascendancy of the reputations of Peter Lombard and Peter Comestor can also be seen in the tradition of medieval chroniclers such as Otto of St. Blaise, who wrote that “in those days Peter Lombard and Peter Comestor shone forth as distinguished masters at Paris.”