Thomas Andrew Archer and Walter Alison Phillips

“ Two years later the king took refuge in the Temple from the violence of the Paris mob, [18] and so late as the spring of 1307 was present at the reception of a new Templar. [19]
Yet for some two years past the king had been plotting treacherous attack on the order. His motives are clear: he had used every expedient to raise money, had robbed and expelled the Jews and the Lombard bankers, had debased the coinage; the suppression of the Templars would at once rescue him from their unwelcome tutelage and replenish his coffers. He cherished also another ambition. ”

“ After some hesitation he concluded a treaty with the sultan of Egypt, much to the annoyance of the Templars, who openly mocked his efforts. On his departure the three orders came to open discord: the Templars laid siege to the Hospitallers in Acre and drove out the Teutonic Knights “in contumeliam imperatoris.” They were successful on all sides. The negotiations with Damascus and Kerak were reopened, and in 1244 Hermann of Perigord wrote to the princes of Europe that after a “silence of fifty-six years the divine mysteries would once more be celebrated in the Holy City.” ”

“ Everard de Barris, the third master, was conspicuous in the second crusade. In the disastrous march from Laodicea to Attalia his troops alone kept up even the show of discipline; and their success prompted Louis VII. to regulate his whole army after the model of the Templar knights. In the French king’s distress for money the Templars lent him large sums, ranging from 2000 silver marks to 30,000 solidi. When Conrad III. of Germany reached Jerusalem he was entertained at their palace (Easter 1148) ; and in the summer of the same year they took part in the unsuccessful siege of Damascus. ”

“ In Portugal the commissioners reported that there were no grounds for accusation. At Mainz the council pronounced the order blameless. At Treves, at Messina, and at Bologna, in Romagna and in Cyprus, they were either acquitted or no evidence was forthcoming against them. At the council of Ravenna the question as to whether torture should be used was answered in the negative except by two Dominicans; all the Templars were absolved—even those who had confessed through fear of torture being pronounced innocent (18th June 1310) . ”

“ Roughly speaking, they confess with the most elaborate detail to every charge, even the most loathsome; and the perusal of their evidence induces a constant suspicion that their answers were practically dictated to them in the process of the examination or invented by the witnesses themselves. [43] In England, where perhaps torture was not used, out of eighty Templars examined only four confessed to the charge of denying Christ, and of these four two were apostate knights. ”

“ In England the Templars were arrested on the 10th of January 1308, in Sicily on the 24th of the same month, in Cyprus on the 27th of May; in Aragon and Castile the process was less easy, for the knights, forewarned, had put their fortresses into a state of defence, notably their strong castle of Monzon, which was only taken after a long siege on the 17th of May, while the last of the Templars strongholds, Castellat, did not fall until the 2nd of November. ”

“ Constitution.—As finally constituted, the order consisted of (1) knights (fratres milites) , (2) chaplains (fratres capellani) , (3) sergeants or esquires (fratres servientes armigeri) , (4) menials and craftsmen (fratres servientes famuli and officii) . All were bound by the rules of the order and enjoyed its privileges. Women were not admitted to the order. [6]
1. At the head of the order was the master of the Temple at Jerusalem (in Cyprus after the fall of the Latin Kingdom) , known as the grand master. ”

“ For more than a hundred years the Templars had been one of the wealthiest and most influential factors in European politics. If we confine our attention to the East, we realize but a smallPower and Influence of the order. part of their enormous power. Two Templars were appointed guardians of the disputed castles on the betrothal of Prince Henry of England and the French princess in 1161. Other Templars were almoners of Henry III of England and of Philip IV of France. One grand master was godfather to a daughter of Louis IX ”

“ Never had the order of the Temple been to all appearance more powerful than immediately before its ruin. Sovereign power, in the sense of that of the Teutonic Knights in Prussia Suppression of the order.or the Knights of St John in Rhodes and later in Malta, it had never possessed; but its privileges and immunities constituted it a church within the church and—in France at least—a state within the state. Philip IV., indeed, in pursuance of his policy of centralizing power in the crown, had from 1287 onwards made tentative efforts to curtail the power and wealth of the order ”

“ In the Spanish peninsula the Temple castles and estates were in some cases handed over to other military orders; in Portugal to the new order of Christ, 1319; in Castile to those of Ucles and Calatrava; in Aragon one frontier castle with its domain, Montasia, was given to the knights of Calatrava; the rest—so far as they had not been annexed by the king and the ricos hombres—to the Hospitallers. As to the Templars: the were granted in most cases generous pensions; some continued to live in groups, though without organization, on their old property ”

“ But, though weak against external foes, the Templars were strong enough for internal warfare. In 1277 they espoused the quarrel of the bishop of Tripoli, formerly a member of the order, against his nephew Bohemond, prince of Antioch and Tripoli, and began a war which lasted three years. In 1276 their conduct drove Hugh III, king of Cyprus and Jerusalem, from Acre to Tyre. ”

“ Spiritual privileges were granted to them by the popes as lavishly as temporal possessions by the princes and people. Pope Adrian IV. allowed them to have their own churches; Eugenius III. added to these the right to have churchyards; and churches and churchyards, as in the case of the order generally, were exempted from the operation of ordinary excommunications and interdicts. Thus a person dying excommunicated, refused burial elsewhere, sometimes—like Geoffrey de Mandeville [13] —found a resting-place in the consecrated ground of the Templars. ”

“ This king sold them the island of Cyprus for 100,000 besants; but, unable to pay the purchase money, they transferred the debt and the principality to Guy of Lusignan. The English king consulted them before deciding on any great military movement; and in June 1192 they advocated the bold plan of an advance on Egypt rather than on Jerusalem. In the disputes for the Latin kingdom of the East the Templars seem to have supported Guy, and, like Richard, were credited with having had a hand in the murder of Conrad of Montferrat (April 1192) . ”

“ Odo refused to yield the chief culprit, though he was well known, and invoked the protection of the pope. Amalric had to vindicate his right by force of arms at Sidon, and died while preparing to take stronger measures. The connexion between the Templars and the Old Man was still vital eighty years later when the two grand masters rebuked the insolence of the Assassin envoys in the presence of Louis IX. Odo de St Amand was succeeded by Arnold de Torroge, who died at Verona on his way to implore European succour for the Holy Land. The power of Saladin was now (1184) increasing daily ”

“ But what is the nature of the evidence "too strong to be explained away" on which Mr Archer bases his opinion that certain of the charges were proved "at least in France"? The modern practice of the English courts tends to discount alto ether the value as evidence of confessions, even freely made. What is the value of these confessions of the Templars which lie before us in the Tables published by Gmelin? The procedure of the Inquisition left no alternative to those accused on "vehement suspicion" of heresy, but confession or death under lingering torture ”

“ The first of these, the Geheimlehre, in the main an expansion of Loiseleur's argument, at once raised up a host of critics; and, as a result of five years study of the archives at Rome and elsewhere, Konrad Schottmüller published in 1887 his Untergang des Templerordens, in which he claimed to have crushed Prutz's conclusions under the weight of a mass of new evidence. The work was, however, uncritical and full of conspicuous errors, and Prutz had little difficulty in turning many of its author's arguments against himself. ”

“ Their property was scattered over every country of Christendom, from Denmark to Spain, from Ireland to Cyprus. Before the middle of the 13th century Matthew Paris reckons their manors at 9000, Alberic of Trois-Fontaines at 7050, whereas the rival order of St John had barely half the latter number. Some fifty years earlier their income from Armenia alone was 20,000 besants. Both in Paris and in London their houses were used as strongholds for the royal treasure. In the Temple in London Hubert de Burgh and the Poitevin favourites of Henry III. stored their wealth ”

“ Two regular meals were allowed for each day; but to these might be added, at the master's discretion, a light collation towards sunset. Meat might be eaten thrice a week; and on other days there was to be a choice of vegetable fare so as to suit the tenderest stomach. ”

“ Meanwhile Saladin had possessed himself of Emesa and Damascus (1174–75) , and, as he was already lord of Egypt, his power hemmed in the Latin kingdom on every side. In July 1173 Amalric was succeeded by his son Baldwin. IV., a boy of twelve. Raymond III., count of Tripoli, a man suspected of being in league with the Saracens, was appointed regent, although in 1176 the masters of the Templars and the Hospitallers united in offering this office to the newly arrived Philip of Flanders. ”

“ A new enemy was now threatening Mahommedan and Christian alike. For a time the Mongol advance may have been welcomed by the Christian cities, as one after another the Mahommedan principalities Successes of Bilbars. of the north fell before the new invaders. But this new danger stimulated the energies of Egypt, which under the Mameluke Bibars encroached year after year on the scanty remains of the Latin Kingdom. The great Frankish lords, fearing that all was lost, made haste to sell their lands to the Templars and Hospitallers before quitting Palestine for ever. ”

“ It set the seal of the highest authority on the popular belief in witchcraft and personal intercourse with the devil, sanctioned the expedient of wringing confessions of such intercourse from the accused by unspeakable tortures, and so made possible the hideous witch-persecutions which darkened the later middle ages and, even in Protestant countries, long survived the Reformation. ”

“ These decisions were at once acted on. At Poitiers Clement had already heard the confessions of seventy-two Templars, carefully selected from the royal prisons (June 29 to July 1) . [30] The grand master and the three preceptors were re-examined at Chinon, and renewed their old confessions (20th August) . Lastly, the bull Regnans in Coelo summoned a great council at Vienne for the 1st of October 1311, when the question of the guilt of the order might be considered. Meanwhile the pope and cardinals had elaborated the organization of the new inquisition. ”

“ Above all, it was the Templars who made the exchange of money with the East possible. It is easy, indeed, to see how they were the ideal bankers of the age; their strongholds were scattered from Armenia to Ireland, their military power and strict discipline ensured the safe transmission of treasure, while their reputation as monks guaranteed their integrity. Thus they became the predecessors, and later the rivals, of the great Italian banking companies. See L. Delisle, “Memoire sur les operations financieres des Templiers” in Memoires de l’Institut national de France, t. ”

“ The pious king,Denunci-
ation of
the order. who had every reason to think well of the order, did not affect to be convinced; but the prospect of spoils was alluring, and he seems to have promised the informer a share of the booty if he could make good his charges. [22] Esquiu now turned to Philip of France, with more immediate success. For the purpose of collecting additional evidence the king caused twelve spies to find admission to the order, and in the meantime sought to win over the pope to his views. ”

“ Perillouse chose est compaignie de feme, que le deable ancien par compaignie de feme a degeté pluisors dou droit sentier de paradis. It is interesting to compare this with the more wholesome view of the best of the contemporary chivalrous poets, e.g. Walther von der Vogelweide or Wolfram von Eschenbach (Parzival) , who hold up true love as the highest earthly incentive to noble deeds. ↑ The bull Omne datum optimum (1163) decreed that the master must be a knight of the order who had taken the vows, and vested the election exclusively in the knights. ”

“ G. Schnürer, Die ursprüngliche Templerregel (1903) ; H. Finke, Papsttum und Untergang des Templerordens (Münster, -i.-W., 1907) ; C. G. Addison, The Knights Templars (London, 3rd ed. 1854) , which contains a valuable account of the suppression of the order in England. For the order and its suppression in Ireland see Herbert Wood, “The Templars in Ireland,” in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. xxvi. Section c. p. 327 (Dublin, 1906–1907) . (W. A. P.) ”