In mathematics, a gerbe is a construct in homological algebra and topology. Gerbes were introduced by Jean Giraud {harv|Giraud|1971} following ideas of Alexandre Grothendieck as a tool for non-commutative cohomology in degree 2. They can be seen as a generalization of principal bundles to the setting of 2-categories. Gerbes provide a convenient, i... Found on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerbe