Peter Cellensis, also known as Peter of Celle, Peter of Celles, Pierre de Celle and Peter de la Celle, (c. 1115 in

Troyes Troyes () is a commune and the capital of the department of Aube in the Grand Est region of north-central France. It is located on the Seine river about south-east of Paris. Troyes is situated within the Champagne wine region and is near to ...

– 20 February 1183, at

Chartres Chartres () is the prefecture of the Eure-et-Loir department in the Centre-Val de Loire region in France. It is located about southwest of Paris. At the 2019 census, there were 170,763 inhabitants in the metropolitan area of Chartres (as d ...

) was a French Benedictine and bishop.

Life

He was born into an aristocratic family of Champagne and educated in the Cluniac

Priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs The Priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs was an influential monastery established in what is now the city of Paris, France. Its surviving buildings are considered treasures of Medieval architecture in the city. History Foundations The oldest known ...

at Paris. He spent part of his youth at Provins with his long-term friend

John of Salisbury John of Salisbury (late 1110s – 25 October 1180), who described himself as Johannes Parvus ("John the Little"), was an English author, philosopher, educationalist, diplomat and bishop of Chartres. Early life and education Born at Salisbury, En ...

.: at Reference n. 11 and n. 12. Became a Benedictine, and in 1150 was made Abbot of " La Celle" in Saint-André-les-Vergers, near Troyes, where he got his surname, Cellensis. In 1162 he was appointed Abbot of St. Rémy at Reims, and in 1181 he succeeded John of Salisbury as

Bishop of Chartres The oldest known list of bishops of Chartres is found in an 11th-century manuscript of Trinity Abbey, Vendôme. It includes 57 names from Adventus (Saint Aventin) to Aguiertus (Agobert) who died in 1060. The most well-known list is included in the ...

. He was highly regarded by many other churchmen of his time such as Thomas Becket, Pope Eugene III and

Pope Alexander III Pope Alexander III (c. 1100/1105 – 30 August 1181), born Roland ( it, Rolando), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 7 September 1159 until his death in 1181. A native of Siena, Alexander became pope after a con ...

.Peter Cellensis
- Catholic Encyclopedia article

Works

His literary productions were edited by Janvier and reprinted in ''

Patrologia Latina The ''Patrologia Latina'' (Latin for ''The Latin Patrology'') is an enormous collection of the writings of the Church Fathers and other ecclesiastical writers published by Jacques-Paul Migne between 1841 and 1855, with indices published between ...

'' (202:405-1146),. They consist of 177 epistles, 95 sermons, and four treatises. The treatises were titled: *''Epistola ad Joannem Saresberiensem'' *''De panibus'' *''Mystica et moralis expositio Mosaici tabernaculi'' *''De conscientia'' *''Tractatus de disciplina claustrali'' His letters were edited separately and are believed to be valuable from an historical standpoint. According to the '' Catholic Encyclopedia'' (1913), his sermons and treatises "are extremely bombastic and allegorical". In addition to the four treatises (De Disciplina Claustrali, De Conscientia, De Puritate Animae and De Affiictione et Lectione), Peter of Celle composed five commentaries (two on Ruth, two on the Tabernacle of Moses and ''De Panibus'', an account of the references to bread in the Bible).These works appear in PL ccii. 397–1146 An account of them appears in Marcel Viller et al., ''Dictionnaire de Spiritualité'', 14 vols to date, Paris 1937.

Modern editions

* Peter of Celle, ''Selected Works: Sermons, the School of the Cloister, On Affliction and Reading, On Conscience'', trans Hugh Feiss, CS, (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1987) * Peter of Celle, ''The Letters of Peter of Celle'', ed. and trans. Julian Haseldine (Oxford, OUP, 2001)

Notes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cellensis, Peter 1110s births 1183 deaths People from Troyes French Benedictines Bishops of Chartres 12th-century French Roman Catholic bishops French abbots