Biography
Peter the Exorcist
About Peter the Exorcist
Peter, remembered as an exorcist in the Roman church, is usually named alongside the priest Marcellinus. The direct June 2 Roman martyrology lists the two together as martyrs. The New Catholic Encyclopedia also distinguishes their roles: Marcellinus was a priest, Peter an exorcist. This Peter is therefore not Pope Marcellinus, whose similar name can confuse catalog records; nor is he an interchangeable title for his companion. The sources reviewed do not give Peter's birth date or place, family, or a securely reconstructed career before the persecution. His historical profile begins with a paired martyr cult and the work identified by his church title. That is enough to identify him without filling the unknown years of his life with a later dramatic narrative.The catacomb of Saints Marcellinus and Peter lies at ad Duas Lauros on Rome's old Via Labicana route. The Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology identifies the two as martyrs buried there. The catacomb site's historical account describes a fourth-century shrine and says Pope Damasus later marked their tombs with an epitaph. The New Catholic Encyclopedia likewise describes that poem and notes a fresco of the pair in the crypt. These are better witnesses to a continuing Roman cult than to Peter's private speech or exact movements during his final days. The physical site demonstrates how a Christian community remembered the pair; it does not itself prove every episode attached to their deaths in later texts.A later passion story describes imprisonment, preaching to Artemius and his household, a hidden execution site, and the discovery of the bodies. The June 6 Roman notice commemorates Artemius, Candida, and Paulina and mentions Peter within that story. The encyclopedia describes the passion as legendary and suggests it developed from Damasus's earlier epitaph. It would therefore be misleading to make June 6 Peter's own feast or to present the whole conversion episode as an independently documented event. The June 2 listing directly commemorates Peter and Marcellinus. It also includes details of chains and execution that should be read as the martyrology's tradition, not an eyewitness transcript of what happened. This account keeps the calendar correction while acknowledging the limits of the narrative sources.The year of Peter's death is not as secure as the paired cult. The Pontifical Commission's public site gives 304 in the Diocletianic persecution; the New Catholic Encyclopedia gives 303. Both place the martyrs in the same early fourth-century setting, but the difference matters for a structured date. This profile leaves birth and death dates unset rather than choosing between the published years or using June 2 as a death certificate. Rome remains the supported city of his martyrdom and tomb tradition. The catacomb site's account later follows the pair's relics to a German monastery, evidence that devotion extended beyond their original shrine. Peter remains significant in the record because his name, role, and shared commemoration are supported by a long Roman cult, while its more colorful stories are marked as tradition.
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