The History of the Knights Templars, the Temple Church, and the Temple
Tekst
“Ainsi que la vertu, le crime a ses degrés
Et jamais on n’a vu la timide innocence
Passer subitement à l’extreme licence.
Un seul jour ne fait point d’un mortel vertueux
Un perfide apostat, un traitre audacieux.”
Phedre, Acte iv. Scene 2.
On Saturday, the 3rd of July, the archbishop of Canterbury, and the bishops, the clergy, and the people of the city of London, were again assembled around the western door of Saint Paul’s cathedral, and Brother John de Stoke, chaplain of the order of the Temple, made his public recantation of the heresies confessed by him, and was then absolved and reconciled to the church in the same manner as Brothers Thomas de Stapelbrugge and Tocci de Thoroldeby, after which a last effort was made to bend the remaining Templars to the wishes of the papal inquisitors.
On Monday, July 5th, at the request of the ecclesiastical council, the bishop of Chichester had an interview with Sir William de la More, the Master of the Temple, taking with him certain learned lawyers, theologians, and scriveners. He exhorted and earnestly pressed him to abjure the heresies of which he stood convicted, by his own confessions and those of his brethren, respecting the absolutions pronounced by him in the chapters, and submit himself to the disposition of the church; but the Master declared that he had never been guilty of the heresies mentioned, and that he would not abjure crimes which he had never committed; so he was sent back to his dungeon.
The next day, (Tuesday, July the 6th,) the bishops of London, Winchester, and Chichester, had an interview in Southwark with the Knight Templar, Philip de Mewes, Preceptor of Garwy, and some serving brethren of the New Temple at London, and told them that they were manifestly guilty of heresy, as appeared from the pope’s bulls, and the depositions taken against the order both in England and France, and also from their own confessions regarding the absolutions pronounced in their chapters, explaining to them that they had grievously erred in believing that the Master of the Temple, who was a mere layman, had power to absolve them from their sins by pronouncing an absolution in the mode previously described, and they warned them that if they persisted in that error they would be condemned as heretics, and that as they could not clear themselves therefrom, it behoved them to abjure all the heresies of which they were accused. The Templars replied that they were ready to abjure the error they had fallen into respecting the absolution, and all heresies of every kind, before the archbishop of Canterbury and the prelates of the council, whenever they should be required so to do, and they humbly and reverently submitted themselves to the orders of the church, beseeching pardon and grace.
A sort of compromise was then made with most of the Templars in custody in London. They were required publicly to repeat a form of confession and abjuration drawn up by the bishops of London and Chichester, and were then solemnly absolved and reconciled to the church in the following terms: —
“In the name of God, Amen. Since you have confessed in due form before the ecclesiastical council of the province of Canterbury that you have gravely erred concerning the sacrament of repentance, in believing that the absolution pronounced by the Master in chapter had as much efficacy as is implied in the words pronounced by him, that is to say, ‘The sins which you have omitted to confess through shamefacedness, or through fear of the justice of the order, we, by virtue of the power delegated to us by God and our lord the pope, forgive you, as far as we are able;’ and since you have confessed that you cannot entirely purge yourselves from the heresies set forth under the apostolic bull, and taking sage counsel with a good heart and unfeigned faith, have submitted yourselves to the judgment and the mercy of the church, having previously abjured the aforesaid heresies, and all heresies of every description, we, by the authority of the council, absolve you from the chain of excommunication wherewith you have been bound, and reconcile you once more to the unity of the church, &c. &c.”
On the 9th of July, Brother Michael de Baskevile, Knight, Preceptor of London, and seventeen other Templars, were absolved and reconciled in full council, in the Episcopal Hall of the see of London, in the presence of a vast concourse of the citizens.
On the 10th of the same month, the Preceptors of Dokesworth, Getinges, and Samford, the guardian of the Temple church at London, Brother Radulph de Evesham, chaplain, with other priests, knights, and serving brethren of the order, were absolved by the bishops of London, Exeter, Winchester, and Chichester, in the presence of the archbishop of Canterbury and the whole ecclesiastical council.
The next day many more members of the fraternity were publicly reconciled to the church on the steps before the south door of Saint Paul’s cathedral, and were afterwards present at the celebration of high mass in the interior of the sacred edifice, when they advanced in a body towards the high altar bathed in tears, and falling down on their knees, they devoutly kissed the sacred emblems of Christianity.
The day after, (July 12,) nineteen other Templars were publicly absolved and reconciled to the church at the same place, in the presence of the earls of Leicester, Pembroke, and Warwick, and afterwards assisted in like manner at the celebration of high mass. The priests of the order made their confessions and abjurations in Latin; the knights pronounced them in Norman French, and the serving brethren for the most part repeated them in English.405 The vast concourse of people collected together could have comprehended but very little of what was uttered, whilst the appearance of the penitent brethren, and the public spectacle of their recantation, answered the views of the papal inquisitors, and doubtless impressed the commonalty with a conviction of the guilt of the order. Many of the Templars were too sick (suffering doubtless from the effect of torture) to be brought down to St. Paul’s, and were therefore absolved and reconciled to the church by the bishops of London, Winchester, and Chichester, at Saint Mary’s chapel near the Tower.
Among the prisoners absolved at the above chapel were many old veteran warriors in the last stage of decrepitude and decay. “They were so old and so infirm,” says the public notary who recorded the proceedings, “that they were unable to stand;” their confessions were consequently made before two masters in theology; they were then led before the west door of the chapel, and were publicly reconciled to the church by the bishop of Chichester; after which they were brought into the sacred building, and were placed on their knees before the high altar, which they devoutly kissed, whilst the tears trickled down their furrowed cheeks. All these penitent Templars were now released from prison, and directed to do penance in different monasteries. Precisely the same form of proceeding was followed at York: the reconciliations and absolution being there carried into effect before the south door of the cathedral.406
Thus terminated the proceedings against the order of the Temple in England.
Similar measures had, in the mean time, been prosecuted against the Templars in all parts of Christendom, but no better evidence of their guilt than that above mentioned was ever discovered. The councils of Tarragona and Aragon, after applying the torture, pronounced the order free from heresy. In Portugal and in Germany the Templars were declared innocent, and in no place situate beyond the sphere of the influence of the king of France and his creature the pope was a single Templar condemned to death.407
A. D. 1312.
On the 16th of October a general council of the church, which had been convened by the pope to pronounce the abolition of the order, assembled at Vienne near Lyons in France. It was opened by the holy pontiff in person, who caused the different confessions and avowals of the Templars to be read over before the assembled nobles and prelates, and then moved the suppression of an order wherein had been discovered such crying iniquities and sinful abominations; but the entire council, with the exception of an Italian prelate, nephew of the pope, and the three French bishops of Rheims, Sens, and Rouen, all creatures of Philip, who had severally condemned large bodies of Templars to be burnt at the stake in their respective dioceses, were unanimously of opinion, that before the suppression of so celebrated and illustrious an order, which had rendered such great and signal services to the christian faith, the members belonging to it ought to be heard in their own defence.408 Such a proceeding, however, did not suit the views of the pope and king Philip, and the assembly was abruptly dismissed by the holy pontiff, who declared that since they were unwilling to adopt the necessary measures, he himself, out of the plenitude of the papal authority, would supply every defect. Accordingly, at the commencement of the following year, the pope summoned a private consistory; and several cardinals and French bishops having been gained over, the holy pontiff abolished the order by an apostolical ordinance, perpetually prohibiting every one from thenceforth entering into it, or accepting or wearing the habit thereof, or representing themselves to be Templars, on pain of excommunication.409
On the 3rd of April, the second session of the council was opened by the pope at Vienne. King Philip and his three sons were present, accompanied by a large body of troops, and the papal decree abolishing the order was published before the assembly.410 The members of the council appear to have been called together merely to hear the decree read. History does not inform of any discussion with reference to it, nor of any suffrages having been taken.
A few months after the close of these proceedings, Brother William de la More, the Master of the Temple in England, died of a broken heart in his solitary dungeon in the Tower, persisting with his last breath in the maintenance of the innocence of his order. King Edward, in pity for his misfortunes, directed the constable of the Tower to hand over his goods and chattels, valued at the sum of 4l. 19s. 11d., to his executors, to be employed in the liquidation of his debts, and he commanded Geoffrey de la Lee, guardian of the lands of the Templars, to pay the arrears of his prison pay (2s. per diem) to the executor, Roger Hunsingon.411
Among the Cotton MS. is a list of the Masters of the Temple, otherwise the Grand Priors or Grand Preceptors of England, compiled under the direction of the prior of the Hospital of Saint John at Clerkenwell, to the intent that the brethren of that fraternity might remember the antient Masters of the Temple in their prayers.412 A few names have been omitted which are supplied in the following list: —
Magister
R. de Pointon.413
Rocelinus de Fossa.414
Richard de Hastings,415 A. D. 1160.
Richard Mallebeench.416
Geoffrey, son of Stephen,417 A. D. 1180.
Thomas Berard, A. D. 1200.
Amaric de St. Maur,418 A. D. 1203.
Alan Marcel,419 A. D. 1224.
Amberaldus, A. D. 1229.
Robert Mountforde,420 A. D. 1234.
Robert Sanford,421 A. D. 1241.
Amadeus de Morestello, A. D. 1254.
Himbert Peraut,422 A. D. 1270.
Robert Turvile,423 A. D. 1290.
Guido de Foresta,424 A. D. 1292.
James de Molay, A. D. 1293.
Brian le Jay,425 A. D. 1295.
William de la More the Martyr.
The only other Templar in England whose fate merits particular attention is Brother Himbert Blanke, the Grand Preceptor of Auvergne. He appears to have been a knight of high honour and of stern unbending pride. From first to last he had boldly protested against the violent proceedings of the inquisitors, and had fearlessly maintained, amid all trials, his own innocence and that of his order. This illustrious Templar had fought under four successive Grand Masters in defence of the christian faith in Palestine, and after the fall of Acre, had led in person several daring expeditions against the infidels. For these meritorious services he was rewarded in the following manner: – After having been tortured and half-starved in the English prisons for the space of five years, he was condemned, as he would make no confession of guilt, to be shut up in a loathsome dungeon, to be loaded with double chains, and to be occasionally visited by the agents of the inquisition, to see if he would confess nothing further!426 In this miserable situation he remained until death at last put an end to his sufferings.
A. D. 1313.
James de Molay, the Grand Master of the Temple, Guy, the Grand Preceptor, a nobleman of illustrious birth, brother to the prince of Dauphiny, Hugh de Peralt, the Visitor-general of the Order, and the Grand Preceptor of Aquitaine, had now languished in the prisons of France for the space of five years and a half. The Grand Master had been compelled to make a confession which he afterwards disowned and stigmatized as a forgery, swearing that if the cardinals who had subscribed it had been of a different cloth, he would have proclaimed them liars, and would have challenged them to mortal combat.427 The other knights had also made confessions which they had subsequently revoked. The secrets of the dark prisons of these illustrious Templars have never been brought to light, but on the 18th of March, A. D. 1313, a public scaffold was erected before the cathedral church of Notre Dame, at Paris, and the citizens were summoned to hear the Order of the Temple convicted by the mouths of its chief officers, of the sins and iniquities charged against it. The four knights, loaded with chains and surrounded by guards, were then brought upon the scaffold by the provost, and the bishop of Alba read their confessions aloud in the presence of the assembled populace. The papal legate then, turning towards the Grand Master and his companions, called upon them to renew, in the hearing of the people, the avowals which they had previously made of the guilt of their order. Hugh de Peralt, the Visitor-General, and the Preceptor of the Temple of Aquitaine, signified their assent to whatever was demanded of them, but the Grand Master raising his arms bound with chains towards heaven, and advancing to the edge of the scaffold, declared in a loud voice, that to say that which was untrue was a crime, both in the sight of God and man. “I do,” said he, “confess my guilt, which consists in having, to my shame and dishonour, suffered myself, through the pain of torture and the fear of death, to give utterance to falsehoods, imputing scandalous sins and iniquities to an illustrious order, which hath nobly served the cause of Christianity. I disdain to seek a wretched and disgraceful existence by engrafting another lie upon the original falsehood.” He was here interrupted by the provost and his officers, and Guy, the Grand Preceptor, having commenced with strong asseverations of his innocence, they were both hurried back to prison.
King Philip was no sooner informed of the result of this strange proceeding, than, upon the first impulse of his indignation, without consulting either pope, or bishop, or ecclesiastical council, he commanded the instant execution of both these gallant noblemen. The same day at dusk they were led out of their dungeons, and were burned to death in a slow and lingering manner upon small fires of charcoal which were kindled on the little island in the Seine, between the king’s garden and the convent of St. Augustine, close to the spot where now stands the equestrian statue of Henri IV.428
Thus perished the last Grand Master of the Temple.
The fate of the persecutors of the order is not unworthy of notice.
A year and one month after the above horrible execution, the pope was attacked by a dysentery, and speedily hurried to his grave. The dead body was transported to Carpentras, where the court of Rome then resided; it was placed at night in a church which caught fire, and the mortal remains of the holy pontiff were almost entirely consumed. His relations quarrelled over the immense treasures he left behind him, and a vast sum of money, which had been deposited for safety in a church at Lucca, was stolen by a daring band of German and Italian freebooters.
Before the close of the same year, king Philip died of a lingering disease which baffled all the art of his medical attendants, and the condemned criminal, upon the strength of whose information the Templars were originally arrested, was hanged for fresh crimes. “History attests,” says Monsieur Raynouard, “that all those who were foremost in the persecution of the Templars, came to an untimely and miserable death.” The last days of Philip were embittered by misfortune; his nobles and clergy leagued against him to resist his exactions; the wives of his three sons were accused of adultery, and two of them were publicly convicted of that crime. The misfortunes of Edward the Second, king of England, and his horrible death in Berkeley Castle, are too well known to be further alluded to.
To save appearances, the pope had published a bull transferring the property, late belonging to the Templars, to the order of the Hospital of Saint John,429 which had just then acquired additional renown and popularity in Europe by the conquest from the infidels of the island of Rhodes. This bull, however, remained for a considerable period nearly a dead letter, and the Hospitallers never obtained a twentieth part of the antient possessions of the Templars.
The kings of Castile, Aragon, and Portugal, created new military orders in their own dominions, to which the estates of the late order of the Temple were transferred, and, annexing the Grand Masterships thereof to their own persons, by the title of Perpetual Administrators, they succeeded in drawing to themselves an immense revenue.430 The kings of Bohemia, Naples, and Sicily, retained possession of many of the houses and strongholds of the Templars in their dominions, and various religious orders of monks succeeded in installing themselves in the convents of the fraternity. The heirs of the donors of the property, moreover, claimed a title to it by escheat, and in most cases where the Hospitallers obtained the lands and estates granted them by the pope, they had to pay large fines to adverse claimants to be put into peaceable possession.431
“The chief cause of the ruin of the Templars,” justly remarks Fuller, “was their extraordinary wealth. As Naboth’s vineyard was the chiefest ground of his blasphemy, and as in England Sir John Cornwall Lord Fanhope said merrily, not he, but his stately house at Ampthill in Bedfordshire was guilty of high treason, so certainly their wealth was the principal cause of their overthrow… We may believe that king Philip would never have taken away their lives if he might have taken their lands without putting them to death, but the mischief was, he could not get the honey unless he burnt the bees.”432
King Philip, the pope, and the European sovereigns, appear to have disposed of all the personalty of the Templars, the ornaments, jewels, and treasure of their churches and chapels, and during the period of five years, over which the proceedings against the order extended, they remained in the actual receipt of the vast rents and revenues of the fraternity. After the promulgation of the bull, assigning the property of the Templars to the Hospitallers, king Philip put forward a claim upon the land to the extent of two hundred thousand pounds for the expenses of the prosecution, and Louis Hutin, his son, required a further sum of sixty thousand pounds from the Hospitallers, before he would consent to surrender the estates into their hands.433 “J’ignore,” says Voltaire, “ce qui revint au pape, mais je vois evidemment que les frais des cardinaux, des inquisiteurs déléguès pour faire ce procès épouvantable monterent à des sommés immenses.”434 The holy pontiff, according to his own account, received only a small portion of the personalty of the order,435 but others make him a large participator in the good things of the fraternity.436
On the imprisonment of the Templars in England, the Temple at London, and all the preceptories dependent upon it, with the manors, farms, houses, lands, and revenues of the fraternity, were placed under the survey of the Court of Exchequer, and extents437 were directed to be taken of the same, after which they were confided to the care of certain trustworthy persons, styled “Guardians of the lands of the Templars,” who were to account for the rents and profits to the king’s exchequer. The bishop of Lichfield and Coventry had the custody of all the lands and tenements in the county of Hants. John de Wilburgham had those in the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, and there were thirty-two other guardians entrusted with the care of the property in the remaining counties of England.438 These guardians were directed to pay various pensions to the old servants and retainers of the Templars dwelling in the different preceptories,439 also the expenses of the prosecution against the order, and they were at different times required to provide for the exigencies of the public service, and to victual the king’s castles and strongholds. On the 12th of January, A. D. 1312, William de Slengesby, guardian of the manor of Ribbestayn in the county of York, was commanded to forward to the constable of the castle of Knaresburgh a hundred quarters of corn, ten quarters of oats, twenty fat oxen, eighty sheep, and two strong carts, towards the victualling of the said fortress, and the king tells him that the same shall be duly deducted when he renders his account to the exchequer of the rents and profits of the said manor.440 The king, indeed, began to dispose of the property as if it was wholly vested in the crown, and made munificent donations to his favourites and friends. In the month of February of the same year, he gave the manors of Etton and Cave to David Earl of Athol, directing the guardians of the lands and tenements of the Templars in the county of York to hand over to the said earl all the corn in those manors, the oxen, calves, ploughs, and all the goods and chattels of the Templars existing therein, together with the ornaments and utensils of the chapel of the Temple.441
On the 16th of May, however, the pope addressed bulls to the king, and to all the earls and barons of the kingdom, setting forth the proceedings of the council of Vienne and the publication of the papal decree, vesting the property late belonging to the Templars in the brethren of the Hospital of St. John, and he commands them forthwith to place the members of that order in possession thereof. Bulls were also addressed to the archbishops of Canterbury and York and their suffragans, commanding them to enforce by ecclesiastical censures the execution of the papal commands.442 King Edward and his nobles very properly resisted this decree, and on the 21st of August the king wrote to the Prior of the Hospital of St. John at Clerkenwell, telling him that the pretensions of the pope to dispose of property within the realm of England, without the consent of parliament, were derogatory to the dignity of the crown and the royal authority; and he commands him, under severe pains and penalties, to refrain from attempting to obtain any portion of the possessions of the Templars.443 The king, indeed, continued to distribute the lands and rents amongst his friends and favourites. At the commencement of the year 1313, he granted the Temple at London, with the church and all the buildings therein, to Aymer de Valence earl of Pembroke;444 and on the 5th of May of the same year he caused several merchants, from whom he had borrowed money, to be placed in possession of many of the manors of the Templars.445
Yielding, however, at last to the exhortations and menaces of the pope, the king, on the 21st of Nov. A. D. 1313, granted the property to the Hospitallers,446 and sent orders to all the guardians of the lands of the Templars, and to various powerful barons who were in possession of the estates, commanding them to deliver them up to certain parties deputed by the Grand Master and chapter of the Hospital of Saint John to receive them.447 At this period, however, many of the heirs of the donors, whose title had been recognized by the law, were in possession of the lands, and the judges held that the king had no power of his own sole authority to transfer them to the order of the Hospital.448 The thunders of the Vatican were consequently vigorously made use of, and all the detainers of the property were doomed by the Roman pontiff to everlasting damnation.449 Pope John, in one of his bulls, dated A. D. 1322, bitterly complains of the disregard by all the king’s subjects of the papal commands. He laments that they had hardened their hearts and despised the sentence of excommunication fulminated against them, and declares that his heart was riven with grief to find that even the ecclesiastics, who ought to have been as a wall of defence to the Hospitallers, had themselves been heinously guilty in the premises.450
At last (A. D. 1324) the pope, the bishops, and the Hospitallers, by their united exertions, succeeded in obtaining an act of parliament, vesting all the property late belonging to the Templars in the brethren of the Hospital of Saint John, in order that the intentions of the donors might be carried into effect by the appropriation of it to the defence of the Holy Land and the succour of the christian cause in the East.451 This statute gave rise to the greatest discontent. The heirs of the donors petitioned parliament for its repeal, alleging that it had been made against law and against reason, and contrary to the opinion of the judges;452 and many of the great barons who held the property by a title recognised by the common law, successfully resisted the claims of the order of the Hospital, maintaining that the parliament had no right to interfere with the tenure of private property, and to dispose of their possessions without their consent.
This struggle between the heirs of the donors on the one hand, and the Hospitallers on the other, continued for a lengthened period; and in the reign of Edward the Third it was found necessary to pass another act of parliament, confirming the previous statute in their favour, and writs were sent to the sheriffs (A. D. 1334) commanding them to enforce the execution of the acts of the legislature, and to take possession, in the king’s name, of all the property unjustly detained from the brethren of the Hospital.453
Whilst the vast possessions, late belonging to the Templars, thus continued to be the subject of contention, the surviving brethren of that dissolved order continued to be treated with the utmost inhumanity and neglect. The ecclesiastical council had assigned to each of them a pension of fourpence a day for subsistence, but this small pittance was not paid, and they were consequently in great danger of dying of hunger. The king, pitying their miserable situation, wrote to the prior of the hospital of St. John at Clerkenwell, earnestly requesting him to take their hard lot into his serious consideration, and not suffer them to come to beggary in the streets.454 The archbishop of Canterbury also exerted himself in their behalf, and sent letters to the possessors of the property, reproving them for the non-payment of the allotted stipends. “This inhumanity,” says he, “awakens our compassion, and penetrates us with the most lively grief. We pray and conjure you in kindness to furnish them, for the love of God and for charity, with the means of subsistence.”455 The archbishop of York caused many of them to be supported in the different monasteries of his diocese.456
Many of the quondam Templars, however, after the dissolution of their order, assumed a secular habit; they blended themselves with the laity, mixed in the pleasures of the world, and even presumed to contract matrimony, proceedings which drew down upon them the severe indignation of the Roman pontiff. In a bull addressed to the archbishop of Canterbury, the pope stigmatises these marriages as unlawful concubinages; he observes that the late Templars remained bound, notwithstanding the dissolution of their order, by their vows of perpetual chastity, and he orders them to be separated from the women whom they had married, and to be placed in different monasteries, where they are to dedicate themselves to the service of God, and the strict performance of their religious vows.457
The Templars adopted the oriental fashion of long beards, and during the proscription of the fraternity, when the fugitives who had thrown off their habits were hunted out like wild beasts, it appears to have been dangerous for laymen to possess beards of more than a few weeks’ growth.
Papers and certificates were granted to men with long beards, to prevent them from being molested by the officers of justice as suspected Templars, as appears from the following curious certificate given by king Edward the Second to his valet, who had made a vow not to shave himself until he had performed a pilgrimage to a certain place beyond sea.
“Rex, etc. Cum dilectus valettus noster Petrus Auger, exhibitor præsentium, nuper voverit quod barbam suam radi non faciat, quousque peregrinationem fecerit in certo loco in partibus transmarinis; et idem Petrus sibi timeat, quod aliqui ipsum, ratione barbæ suæ prolixæ fuisse Templarium imponere sibi velint, et ei inferre impedimenta seu gravamina ex hac causa; Nos veritati volentes testimonium pertulere, vobis tenore præsentium intimamus, quod prædictus Petrus est valettus cameræ nostræ, nec unquam fuit Templarius, sed barbam suam sic prolixam esse permittit, ex causa superius annotata, etc. Teste Rege, &c.”458