diff --git a/src/gitolite.pm b/src/gitolite.pm
index d67cd13..fcbda13 100644
--- a/src/gitolite.pm
+++ b/src/gitolite.pm
@@ -1077,6 +1077,7 @@ sub setup_authkeys
             local $/ = undef;
             local @ARGV = ($pubkey);
             $pubkey_content = <>;
+            $pubkey_content =~ s/^\s*#.*\n//gm;
         }
         $pubkey_content =~ s/\s*$/\n/;
         # don't trust files with multiple lines (i.e., something after a newline)
diff --git a/src/sshkeys-lint b/src/sshkeys-lint
index 5e6d9a8..3d9de51 100755
--- a/src/sshkeys-lint
+++ b/src/sshkeys-lint
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ print "\n";
 my @pubkeys = sort glob("*.pub");
 die "no *.pub files here\n" unless @pubkeys;
 for my $pub (@pubkeys) {
-    my @lines = filelines($pub);
+    my @lines = grep { ! /^\s*#/ } filelines($pub);
     die "$pub has more than one line\n" if @lines > 1;
     die "$pub does not start with ssh-rsa or ssh-dss\n" unless $lines[0] =~ /^(?:ssh-rsa|ssh-dss) (\S+)/;
     my $key = $1;