Unit 5 · The Knights Templar

Jerusalem is a very old city. It is holy to Jews, Christians and Muslims. In 1099, Christian armies from Europe took the city in a war. These wars are called the Crusades. After that, more Christian travelers came from Europe to visit.

A pilgrim is a person who travels to a holy place to pray. Many pilgrims landed at a port by the sea. Then they walked inland to Jerusalem. The road ran through dry hills with few towns.

Robbers hid along these roads. They attacked travelers and took their things. Pilgrims had no one to protect them. Some people began to ask: who will keep the travelers safe?

Hugh of Payns was a knight from France. About 1119 or 1120, he and a few other knights made a plan in Jerusalem. They would guard pilgrims on the roads. They would also live like monks, with prayer and simple lives.

They called themselves the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ. King Baldwin II of Jerusalem gave them rooms in part of his palace. The palace stood on the Temple Mount. People then believed King Solomon’s Temple had once stood there.

Because of that building, people called the knights the Templars. A Templar is a member of this order. An order is a group of people who live by the same religious rules. Their full name grew long: the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon.

William of Tyre was an archbishop who lived in the Holy Land. In the 1170s and 1180s, he wrote a long history of the kingdom of Jerusalem. He told how the Templars began. He said it happened in 1118.

But William wrote about 50 years after the start. He was not there. Historians today compare his book with other old records. Most of them think the Templars began in 1119 or early 1120. The start is documented, but the exact year is disputed.

William also said there were only nine knights for nine years. Other records show Hugh traveling in Europe to find new members by 1127. So many historians think the nine-knights story is too simple.

In about 1129, church leaders met in the town of Troyes, in France. Hugh of Payns came to ask for their help. The meeting is called the Council of Troyes. There, the Templars got a written Rule.

A Rule is a book of rules for how members of an order live. The Templars’ first Rule was written in Latin. It had 72 short parts. Much of it was based on an older Rule for monks, the Rule of Saint Benedict.

A monk is a man who gives his life to God and lives by strict rules with other monks. Most monks prayed and worked quietly. The Templars were new. They were monks who also rode to battle.

When a man joined the Templars, he made three big promises. He would own nothing for himself. He would not marry. He would obey the leaders of the order. Promises like these are called vows. Each one is a vow.

The Rule filled each day with prayer. The brothers ate meals together in one hall. They were to eat quietly while someone read aloud. Their clothes were plain, with no fancy decorations.

Some rules were about knightly life. The Rule said how brothers should care for their horses. It also said the brothers must not go hunting for fun. The one animal they were allowed to hunt was the lion.

A mantle is a long cloak worn over other clothes. The Rule said the knights should wear white mantles. White stood for a clean, pure life. Other brothers wore black or brown.

In the 1140s, a pope allowed the Templars to add a red cross to their clothes. The red cross showed they would give their lives for their faith. Soon the white mantle with the red cross was famous.

The Templars also had a seal. A seal is a stamp pressed into wax to show who sent a letter. Their seal showed two knights riding on one horse. Many people think it stood for being poor and sharing. Historians still talk about its meaning.

Many people in Europe admired the Templars. They wanted to help guard the pilgrims. So they gave gifts. Kings and nobles gave land, farms, mills and money. Some farmers gave a small field.

The Templars set up houses on this land. A Templar house that ran farms and land in one area is often called a commandery. Soon there were Templar houses in France, England, Spain, Portugal, Italy and other lands.

Most brothers in Europe were not fighters. Many ran farms. They sold crops and wool. They sent money and horses east to the knights in the Holy Land. The farms in Europe fed the fight far away.

The Templars had strong houses and trusted brothers. So people asked them to keep money safe. A person could leave coins or treasure at a Templar house. This is called a deposit. The Templars kept a record of it.

The Templars also helped move money over long distances. Their houses were in many countries. They could write down a payment in one place and settle it through another house. Historians call this a transfer. It is safer than carrying gold on a ship.

In time, even kings trusted them. The Templar house in Paris kept money for the kings of France. Historians call this an early kind of banking. Some popular books add more details. Historians are careful to say only what the old records show.

In the Holy Land, the Templars guarded roads and borders. They built and held castles. One, near the sea at Atlit, was begun about 1218. It was called the Pilgrims’ Castle. Its thick walls faced the water on three sides.

In Portugal, the Templars built a castle at Tomar, begun in 1160. It became their main house in that country. Its round church still stands today. Visitors can walk inside it.

In London, the Templars built the Temple Church. Its round part was blessed in 1185. Part of it is round. It was built to remind people of a famous round church in Jerusalem. You can still visit it. A castle guarded land. A church was for prayer. The Templars needed both.

Bernard of Clairvaux was one of the most famous monks in Europe. People listened when he spoke. Hugh of Payns asked him for help. Around the 1130s, Bernard wrote to Hugh and his knights. His writing is called In Praise of the New Knighthood.

Bernard said the Templars were a new kind of knight. Ordinary knights often fought for money or pride. Bernard said Templars fought to protect others and lived simple, holy lives. He praised their plain clothes and their obedience.

Bernard’s letter was a kind of praise. It helped the Templars find new members and gifts. When you read old writing, it helps to ask who wrote it and why. Bernard wanted people to support the new order. He was their supporter.

Not everyone praised the Templars. As the order grew rich, some people grew uneasy. One of them was William of Tyre, the archbishop who wrote the history we read before.

William said the Templars began humble and poor. But he wrote that later they became proud. He complained that they did not obey the bishops of the Holy Land. The pope had let them answer to him alone, not to local bishops. That made some church leaders angry.

A critic is a person who points out what he thinks is wrong. Bernard was a supporter. William was a critic. To understand the Templars, historians read both. Each one saw part of the story from his own place.

In 1291, the city of Acre fell to a Muslim army. Acre was the last big Christian city in the Holy Land. The Templars lost their main home there. They moved their headquarters to the island of Cyprus.

Now some people asked a hard question. The Templars had been made to guard the Holy Land. If they could not do that, why did they still need so much land and money? The Templars still had many rich houses in Europe.

King Philip IV ruled France. He needed a lot of money for wars. He had already taken wealth from other groups in France. Many historians think he wanted the Templars’ wealth and power too. Philip said he acted because he believed they had done wrong.

On 14 September 1307, Philip sent out letters to his officers all over France. The letters were sealed with wax. The officers were told to keep the plan secret until the right day.

The letters said terrible things about the Templars. They used strong words like horrible and bitter. These words made readers feel angry and afraid. Some words are chosen to stir up feelings. They are called loaded words. They can push people to believe before they see proof.

At dawn on Friday, 13 October 1307, officers knocked on the doors of Templar houses across France. They did it all at once. That way, no one could warn the others. Most of the men arrested were older brothers who ran farms, not young warriors.

The king’s men said the Templars had insulted the cross and turned away from Christ. They also said the Templars prayed to a strange idol. Each one is called a charge. A charge is a claim that someone did something wrong.

The prisoners were questioned harshly. Some were hurt. Many were frightened and alone. Frightened people often say what questioners want to hear. Many Templars chose to confess. That means they said they were guilty.

The leader of the Templars, called the Grand Master, was Jacques de Molay. In October 1307, he confessed to some charges. Later he took his confession back. Many others did the same. Historians still argue about how much of the charges was true. Many think the worst charges were made up.

From 1309 to 1311, a group sent by the pope met in Paris. It is called the papal commission. It heard about 231 Templar brothers. Clerks wrote down what they said in Latin.

These pages were kept for hundreds of years. In the 1800s, a French historian named Jules Michelet printed them in two big books. They came out between 1841 and 1851. Today anyone can read them free online.

The records are full of real voices. Many speakers were not famous knights. They were farm managers, servants and cooks. A record like this is a primary source: something made at the time by people who were there.

Pope Clement V was the head of the Catholic Church. He was French, and he lived in France, not Rome. King Philip pushed him hard to act against the Templars.

In August 1308, the pope sent three cardinals to Chinon Castle in France. A cardinal is a high leader in the Catholic Church. There they questioned Jacques de Molay and other Templar leaders.

The leaders asked to be forgiven. The cardinals gave them absolution. That means they forgave them for their sins in the name of the Church. The cardinals let them take part in church services again. They wrote all of this on a large parchment.

An archive is a place that keeps old papers and records safe. The Vatican has one of the biggest archives in the world. It holds papers from many centuries.

The Chinon Parchment was in that archive all along. But it was in the wrong place. An old list described it too vaguely to find. So it was misfiled, and almost no one read it.

In September 2001, the historian Barbara Frale found it. She could read the old Latin handwriting. In 2007, the Vatican helped print an exact copy of the Templar trial papers. Only 799 numbered copies were made. One of them is in the Law Library of Congress, in Washington, D.C.

When news of the find came out, some headlines said the pope had found the Templars innocent. That went further than the parchment. The parchment says the cardinals forgave certain leaders. It did not end the trials.

Frale thinks Pope Clement wanted to fix the order, not destroy it. She thinks the king’s pressure was too strong for him. Many historians agree with parts of her view. Others are more careful. This is a question historians still debate.

A good reader asks two questions. What does the document really say? And what are people claiming it says? The distance between those answers is where mistakes can grow. Checking the evidence yourself helps you see clearly.

From 1311 to 1312, church leaders met at the Council of Vienne, in France. On 22 March 1312, Pope Clement V ended the Templar order. He chose to suppress it. That means he shut it down for good.

But the pope did not say the order was guilty. He said he was ending it by his own power as pope, not by a court’s judgment. So the Templars were never found guilty as a whole group.

In May 1312, the pope gave most Templar lands to another order of knights, the Hospitallers. In Portugal, the king started a new group in 1319, with the pope’s approval. It was called the Order of Christ, and it took over the Templar lands there. Some brothers joined it.

Jacques de Molay was held in prison for about seven years. In March 1314, he spoke out in public. He said the order was holy and the charges were false. For this, he and another leader, Geoffroi de Charney, were put to death by fire. It happened on 18 March 1314, on a small island in Paris.

A writer from that time said Molay called on God to set things right. Later, the story grew bigger. People said Molay cursed the pope and the king. They said both would die within a year. This is a legend, a story told often that may not be true.

Here is a fact that helped the legend grow. Pope Clement died in April 1314. King Philip died in November 1314. Both died that year. But the full curse story was written down years later. The first writer does not record it.

Many people say Friday the 13th is unlucky because of the Templar arrests. The arrest date is real. But written fears about Friday the 13th show up in the 1800s. A 1907 novel called Friday, the Thirteenth helped spread the idea. The Templar link was added even later.

Other stories say the Templars hid a great treasure before the arrests. Some say ships sailed away with gold. Historians have looked hard through the trial records. They have found no solid proof of a treasure fleet.

No Templar treasure has ever been found. People have searched castles, churches and islands. A story can be exciting and still have no proof. Historians say what the evidence shows, and they name a legend as a legend.

Some people say the Templars did not really end. They say the knights hid. Later, they say, the knights became the Freemasons, a brotherhood that grew out of the lodges of stonemasons. But the first written link between Masons and crusading knights shows up in 1737. Claims about the Templars came in the 1750s. That is more than 400 years after 1312. No record from the Templars’ time links the two groups.

Later, some Masonic groups named themselves Knights Templar. In 1880, thousands of these American Knights Templar met in Chicago. They camped in tents by Lake Michigan and wore plumed hats. They even printed their own daily newspaper for the event.

These Chicago knights admired the old Templars. They were inspired by them. But they were not descended from them. That means no line of members runs back to the medieval order. Knowing that difference is a big part of thinking like a historian.