Peter Aureol (Petrus Aureolus, Petrus Aureoli, Peter Auriol, Peter Oriole), French Franciscan philosopher and theologian called "Doctor Facundus," was born near Gourdon, Lot. He entered the Franciscan order before 1300 and was assigned to the province of Aquitaine. In 1304, Aureol was at Paris, but whether he studied under John Duns Scotus there is uncertain. His first work was Tractatus de Paupertate (1311). In 1312 he was lector at the studium generale at Bologna where he composed his only purely philosophical work, the unfinished Tractatus de Principiis Naturae. From 1314 to 1316, as lector at Toulouse, he wrote the original and influential tract De Conceptione B. M. V. and the Repercussorium against certain opponents of the tract. Probably in his Bologna and Toulouse period, Aureol was composing his extensive Scriptum super Primum Sententiarum; the work was substantially completed by late 1316 and dedicated to Pope John XXII. At the Chapter General...