The History of the Knights Templars, the Temple Church, and the Temple

On the arrival of the latter in England he was constituted sheriff of Gloucestershire and of Sussex, and was shortly afterwards sent into Normandy at the head of a large body of forces. He commanded in the famous battle fought A. D. 1202 before the fortress of Mirabel, in which the unfortunate prince Arthur and his lovely sister Eleanor, “the pearl of Brittany,” were taken prisoners, together with the earl of March, most of the nobility of Poictou and Anjou, and two hundred French knights, who were ignominiously put into fetters, and sent away in carts to Normandy. This battle was followed, as is well known, by the mysterious death of prince Arthur, who is said to have been murdered by king John himself, whilst the beautiful Eleanor, nicknamed La Bret, who, after the death of her brother, was the next heiress to the crown of England, was confined in close custody in Bristol Castle, where she remained a prisoner for life. At the head of four thousand infantry and three thousand cavalry, the earl Marshall attempted to relieve the fortress of Chateau Gaillard, which was besieged by Philip king of France, but failed in consequence of the non-arrival of seventy flat-bottomed vessels, whose progress up the river Seine had been retarded by a strong contrary wind.⁵⁰⁸ For his fidelity and services to the crown he was rewarded with numerous manors, lands, and castles, both in England and in Normandy, with the whole province of Leinster in Ireland, and he was made governor of the castles of Caermerden, Cardigan, and Coher.

In the year 1204 he was sent ambassador to Paris, and on his return he continued to be the constant and faithful attendant of the English monarch. He was one of the witnesses to the surrender by king John at Temple Ewell of his crown and kingdom to the pope,⁵⁰⁹ and when the barons’ war broke out he was the constant mediator and negotiator between the king and his rebellious subjects, enjoying the confidence and respect of both parties. When the armed barons came to the Temple, where king John resided, to demand the liberties and laws of king Edward, he became surety for the performance of the king’s promise to satisfy their demands. He was afterwards deputed to inquire what these laws and liberties were, and after having received at Stamford the written demands of the barons, he urged the king to satisfy them. Failing in this, he returned to Stamford to explain the king’s denial, and the barons’ war then broke out. He afterwards accompanied king John to the Tower, and when the barons entered London he was sent to announce the submission of the king to their desires. Shortly afterwards he attended king John to Runnymede, in company with Brother Americ, the Master of the Temple, and at the earnest request of these two exalted personages, king John was at last induced to sign Magna Charta.⁵¹⁰

On the death of that monarch, in the midst of a civil war and a foreign invasion, he assembled the loyal bishops and barons of the land at Gloucester, and by his eloquence, talents, and address, secured the throne for king John’s son, the young prince Henry.⁵¹¹ The greater part of England was at that time in the possession of prince Louis, the dauphin of France, who had landed with a French army at Sandwich, and was supported by the late king’s rebellious barons in a claim to the throne. Pembroke was chosen guardian and protector of the young king and of the kingdom, and exerted himself with great zeal and success in driving out the French, and in bringing back the English to their antient allegiance.⁵¹² He offered pardon in the king’s name to the disaffected barons for their past offences. He confirmed, in the name of the youthful sovereign, Magna Charta and the Charta Forestæ; and as the great seal had been lost by king John, together with all his treasure, in the washes of Lincolnshire, the deeds of confirmation were sealed with the seal of the earl marshall.⁵¹³ He also extended the benefit of Magna Charta to Ireland, and commanded all the sheriffs to read it publicly at the county courts, and enforce its observance in every particular. Having thus exerted himself to remove the just complaints of the disaffected, he levied a considerable army, and having left the young king at Bristol, he proceeded to lay siege to the castle of Mountsorel in Leicestershire, which was in the possession of the French.

Prince Louis had, in the mean time, despatched an army of twenty thousand men, officered by six hundred knights, from London against the northern counties. These mercenaries stormed various strong castles, despoiled the towns, villages, and religious houses, and laid waste the open country. The protector concentrated all his forces at Newarke, and on Whit-monday, A. D. 1217, he marched at their head, accompanied by his eldest son and the young king, to raise the siege of Lincoln Castle. On arriving at Stow he halted his army, and leaving the youthful monarch and the royal family at that place under the protection of a strong guard, he proceeded with the remainder of his forces to Lincoln. On Saturday in Whitsun week (A. D. 1217) he gained a complete victory over the disaffected English and their French allies, and gave a deathblow to the hopes and prospects of the dauphin. Four earls, eleven barons, and four hundred knights, were taken prisoners, besides common soldiers innumerable. The earl of Perch, a Frenchman, was slain whilst manfully defending himself in a churchyard, having previously had his horse killed under him. The rebel force lost all their baggage, provisions, treasure, and the spoil which they had accumulated from the plunder of the northern provinces, among which were many valuable gold and silver vessels torn from the churches and the monasteries.

As soon as the fate of the day was decided, the protector rode back to the young king at Stow, and was the first to communicate the happy intelligence of his victory.⁵¹⁴ He then marched upon London, where prince Louis and his adherents had fortified themselves, and leaving a corps of observation in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, he proceeded to take possession of all the eastern counties. Having received intelligence of the concentration of a French fleet at Calais to make a descent upon the English coast, he armed the ships of the Cinque Ports, and, intercepting the French vessels, he gained a brilliant victory over a much superior naval force of the enemy.⁵¹⁵ By his valour and military talents he speedily reduced the French prince to the necessity of suing for peace.⁵¹⁶ On the 11th of September a personal interview took place between the latter and the protector at Staines near London, and it was agreed that the prince and all the French forces should immediately evacuate the country.

Having thus rescued England from the danger of a foreign yoke, and having established tranquillity throughout the country, and secured the young king Henry in the peaceable and undisputed possession of the throne, he died (A. D. 1219) at Caversham, leaving behind him, says Matthew Paris, such a reputation as few could compare with. His dead body was, in the first instance, conveyed to the abbey at Reading, where it was received by the monks in solemn procession. It was placed in the choir of the church, and high mass was celebrated with vast pomp. On the following day it was brought to Westminster Abbey, where high mass was again performed; and from thence it was borne in state to the Temple Church, where it was solemnly interred on Ascension-day, A. D. 1219.⁵¹⁷ Matthew Paris tells us that the following epitaph was composed to the memory of the above distinguished nobleman: —

“Sum quem Saturnum sibi sensit Hibernia, solem

Anglia, Mercurium Normannia, Gallia Martem.”

For he was, says he, always the tamer of the mischievous Irish, the honour and glory of the English, the negotiator of Normandy, in which he transacted many affairs, and a warlike and invincible soldier in France.

The inscription upon his tomb was, in Camden’s time, almost illegible, as before mentioned, and the only verse that could be read was,

“Miles eram Martis Mars multos vicerat armis.”

All the historians of the period speak in the highest terms of the earl of Pembroke as a warrior⁵¹⁸ and a statesman, and concur in giving him a noble character. Shakspeare, consequently, in his play of King John, represents him as the eloquent intercessor in behalf of the unfortunate prince Arthur.

Surrounded by the nobles, he thus addresses the king on his throne —

 
“Pembroke. I (as one that am the tongue of these,
To sound the purposes of all their hearts,)
Both for myself and them, (but, chief of all,
Your safety, for the which myself and them
Bend their best studies,) heartily request
The enfranchisement of Arthur; whose restraint
Doth move the murmuring lips of discontent
To break into this dangerous argument, —
If, what in rest you have, in right you hold,
Why then your fears, (which, as they say, attend
The steps of wrong,) should move you to mew up
Your tender kinsman, and to choke his days
With barbarous ignorance, and deny his youth
The rich advantage of good exercise?
That the time’s enemies may not have this
To grace occasions, let it be our suit
That you have bid us ask his liberty;
Which for our goods we do no further ask,
Than whereupon our weal, on you depending.
Counts it your weal, he have his liberty.”
 

Afterwards, when he is shown the dead body of the unhappy prince, he exclaims —

 
“O death, made proud with pure and princely beauty!
The earth had not a hole to hide this deed.
 

·······

 
All murders past do stand excused in this:
And this, so sole, and so unmatchable,
Shall give a holiness, a purity,
To the yet unbegotten sin of times,
And prove a deadly bloodshed but a jest,
Exampled by this heinous spectacle.”
 

This illustrious nobleman was a great benefactor to the Templars. He granted them the advowsons of the churches of Spenes, Castelan-Embyan, together with eighty acres of land in Eschirmanhir.⁵¹⁹

By the side of the earl of Pembroke, towards the northern windows of the Round of the Temple Church, reposes a youthful warrior, clothed in armour of chain mail; he has a long buckler on his left arm, and his hands are pressed together in supplication upon his breast. This is the monumental effigy of Robert Lord de Ros, and is the most elegant and interesting in appearance of all the cross-legged figures in the Temple Church. The head is uncovered, and the countenance, which is youthful, has a remarkably pleasing expression, and is graced with long and flowing locks of curling hair. On the left side of the figure is a ponderous sword, and the armour of the legs has a ridge or seam up the front, which is continued over the knee, and forms a kind of garter below the knee. The feet are trampling on a lion, and the legs are crossed in token that the warrior was one of those military enthusiasts who so strangely mingled religion and romance, “whose exploits form the connecting link between fact and fiction, between history and the fairy tale.” It has generally been thought that this interesting figure is intended to represent a genuine Knight Templar clothed in the habit of his order, and the loose garment or surcoat thrown over the ring-armour, and confined to the waist by a girdle, has been described as “a flowing mantle with a kind of cowl.” This supposed cowl is nothing more than a fold of the chain mail, which has been covered with a thick coating of paint. The mantle is the common surcoat worn by the secular warriors of the day, and is not the habit of the Temple. Moreover, the long curling hair manifests that the warrior whom it represents could not have been a Templar, as the brethren of the Temple were required to cut their hair close, and they wore long beards.

In an antient genealogical account of the Ros family,⁵²⁰ written at the commencement of the reign of Henry the Eighth, A. D. 1513, two centuries after the abolition of the order of the Temple, it is stated that Robert Lord de Ros became a Templar, and was buried at London. The writer must have been mistakened, as that nobleman remained in possession of his estates up to the day of his death, and his eldest son, after his decease, had livery of his lands, and paid his fine to the king in the usual way, which would not have been the case if the Lord de Ros had entered into the order of the Temple. He was doubtless an associate or honorary member of the fraternity, and the circumstance of his being buried in the Temple Church probably gave rise to the mistake. The shield of his monumental effigy is charged with three water bougets, the armorial ensigns of his family, similar to those observable in the north aisle of Westminster Abbey.

Robert Lord de Ros, in consequence of the death of his father in the prime of life, succeeded to his estates at the early age of thirteen, and in the second year of the reign of Richard Cœur de Lion, (A. D. 1190,) he paid a fine of one thousand marks, (£666, 13s. 4d.,) to the king for livery of his lands. In the eighth year of the same king, he was charged with the custody of Hugh de Chaumont, an illustrious French prisoner of war, and was commanded to keep him safe as his own life. He, however, devolved the duty upon his servant, William de Spiney, who, being bribed, suffered the Frenchman to escape from the Castle of Bonville, in consequence whereof the Lord de Ros was compelled by king Richard to pay eight hundred pounds, the ransom of the prisoner, and William de Spiney was executed.⁵²¹

On the accession of king John to the throne, the Lord de Ros was in high favour at court, and received by grant from that monarch the barony of his ancestor, Walter l’Espec. He was sent into Scotland with letters of safe conduct to the king of Scots, to enable that monarch to proceed to England to do homage, and during his stay in Scotland he fell in love with Isabella, the beautiful daughter of the Scottish king, and demanded and obtained her hand in marriage. He attended her royal father on his journey into England to do homage to king John, and was present at the interview between the two monarchs on the hill near Lincoln, when the king of Scotland swore fealty on the cross of Hubert archbishop of Canterbury, in the presence of the nobility of both kingdoms, and a vast concourse of spectators.⁵²² From his sovereign the Lord de Ros obtained various privileges and immunities, and in the year 1213 he was made sheriff of Cumberland. He was at first faithful to king John, but, in common with the best and bravest of the nobles of the land, he afterwards shook off his allegiance, raised the standard of rebellion, and was amongst the foremost of those bold patriots who obtained Magna Charta. He was chosen one of the twenty-five conservators of the public liberties, and engaged to compel John to observe the great charter.⁵²³ he infant prince Henry, through the influence and persuasions of the earl of Pembroke, the Protector,⁵²⁴ and he received from the youthful monarch various marks of the royal favour. He died in the eleventh year of the reign of the young king Henry the Third, (A. D. 1227,) and was buried in the Temple Church.⁵²⁵

The above Lord de Ros was a great benefactor to the Templars. He granted them the manor of Ribstane, and the advowson of the church; the ville of Walesford, and all his windmills at that place; the ville of Hulsyngore, with the wood and windmill there; also all his land at Cattall, and various tenements in Conyngstreate, York.⁵²⁶

Weever has evidently misapplied the inscription seen on the antient monument of Brother Constance Hover, the visitor-general of the order of the Temple, to the above nobleman.

As regards the remaining monumental effigies in the Temple Church, it appears utterly impossible at this distance of time to identify them, as there are no armorial bearings on their shields, or aught that can give us a clue to their history. There can be no doubt but that two of the figures are intended to represent William Marshall, junior, and Gilbert Marshall, both earls of Pembroke, and sons of the Protector. Matthew Paris tells us that these noblemen were buried by the side of their father in the Temple Church, and their identification would consequently have been easy but for the unfortunate removal of the figures from their original situations by the immortal Roger Gillingham.

Next to the Lord de Ros reposes a stern warrior, with both his arms crossed on his breast. He has a plain wreath around his head, and his shield, which has no armorial bearings, is slung on his left arm. By the side of this figure is a coaped stone, which formed the lid of an antient sarcophagus. The ridges upon it represent a cross, the top of which terminates in a trefoil, whilst the foot rests on the head of a lamb. From the middle of the shaft of the cross issue two fleurets or leaves. As the lamb was the emblem of the order of the Temple, it is probable that the sarcophagus to which this coaped stone belonged, contained the dead body either of one of the Masters, or of one of the visitors-general of the Templars.

Of the figures in the northernmost group of monumental effigies in the Temple Church, only two are cross-legged. The first figure on the south side of the row, which is straight-legged, holds a drawn sword in its right hand pointed towards the ground; the feet are supported by a leopard, and the cushion under the head is adorned with sculptured foliage and flowers. The third figure has the sword suspended on the right side, and the hands are joined in a devotional attitude upon the breast. The fourth has a spirited appearance. It represents a cross-legged warrior in the act of drawing a sword, whilst he is at the same time trampling a dragon under his feet. It is emblematical of the religious soldier conquering the enemies of the christian church. The next and last monumental effigy, which likewise has its legs crossed, is similar in dress and appearance to the others; the right arm reposes on the breast, and the left hand rests on the sword. These two last figures, which correspond in character, costume, and appearance, may perhaps be the monumental effigies of William and Gilbert Marshall, the two sons of the Protector.

William Marshall, commonly called THE YOUNGER, was one of the bold and patriotic barons who compelled king John to sign Magna Charta. He was appointed one of the twenty-five conservators of the public liberties, and was one of the chief leaders and promoters of the barons’ war, being a party to the covenant for holding the city and Tower of London.⁵²⁷ On the death of king John, his father the Protector brought him over to the cause of the young king Henry, the rightful heir to the throne, whom he served with zeal and fidelity. He was a gallant soldier, and greatly distinguished himself in a campaign in Wales. He overthrew Prince Llewellyn in battle with the loss of eight thousand men, and laid waste the dominions of that prince with fire and sword.⁵²⁸ For these services he had scutage of all his tenants in twenty counties in England! He was made governor of the castles of Cardigan and Carmarthen, and received various marks of royal favour. In the fourteenth year of the reign of king Henry the Third, he was made captain-general of the king’s forces in Brittany, and, whilst absent in that country, a war broke out in Ireland, whereupon he was sent to that kingdom with a considerable army to restore tranquillity. He married Eleanor, the daughter of king John by the beautiful Isabella of Angoulême, and he was consequently the brother-in-law of the young king Henry the Third.⁵²⁹ He died without issue, A. D. 1231, (15 Hen. III.,) and on the 14th of April he was buried in the Temple Church at London, by the side of his father the Protector. He was greatly beloved by king Henry the Third, who attended his funeral, and Matthew Paris tells us, that when the king saw the dead body covered with the mournful pall, he heaved a deep sigh, and was greatly affected.⁵³⁰

The manors, castles, estates, and possessions of this powerful nobleman in England, Wales, Ireland, and Normandy, were immense. He gave extensive forest lands to the monks of Tinterne in Wales; he founded the monastery of Friars preachers in Dublin, and to the Templars he gave the church of Westone with all its appurtenances, and granted and confirmed to them the borough of Baudac, the estate of Langenache, with various lands, windmills, and villeins of the soil.⁵³¹

Gilbert Marshall, earl of Pembroke, brother to the above, and third son of the Protector, succeeded to the earldom and the vast estates of his ancestors on the melancholy murder in Ireland of his gallant brother Richard, “the flower of the chivalry of that time,” (A. D. 1234.) The year after his accession to the title he married Margaret, the daughter of the king of Scotland, who is described by Matthew Paris as “a most elegant girl,”⁵³² and received with her a splendid dowry. In the year 1236 he assumed the cross, and joined the king’s brother, the earl of Cornwall, in the promotion of a Crusade to the Holy Land.

Matthew Paris gives a long account of an absurd quarrel which broke out between this earl of Pembroke and king Henry the Third, when the latter was eating his Christmas dinner at Winchester, in the year 1239.⁵³³

At a great meeting of Crusaders at Northampton, he took a solemn oath upon the high altar of the church of All Saints to proceed without delay to Palestine to fight against the enemies of the cross;⁵³⁴ but his intentions were frustrated by the hand of death. At a tournament held at Ware, A. D. 1241, he was thrown from his horse, and died a few hours afterwards at the monastery at Hertford. His entrails were buried in the church of the Virgin at that place, but his body was brought up to London, accompanied by all his family, and was interred in the Temple Church by the side of his father and eldest brother.⁵³⁵

The above Gilbert Marshall granted to the Templars the church of Weston, the borough of Baldok, lands and houses at Roydon, and the wood of Langnoke.⁵³⁶

All the five sons of the elder Marshall, the Protector, died without issue in the reign of Henry the Third, and the family became extinct. They followed one another to the grave in regular succession, so that each attained for a brief period to the dignity of the earldom, and to the hereditary office of Earl Marshall.

Matthew Paris accounts for the melancholy extinction of this noble and illustrious family in the following manner.

He tells us that the elder Marshall, the Protector, during a campaign in Ireland, seized the lands of the reverend bishop of Fernes, and kept possession of them in spite of a sentence of excommunication which was pronounced against him. After the Protector had gone the way of all flesh, and had been buried in the Temple Church, the reverend bishop came to London, and mentioned the circumstance to the king, telling him that the earl of Pembroke had certainly died excommunicated. The king was much troubled and alarmed at this intelligence, and besought the bishop to go to the earl’s tomb and absolve him from the bond of excommunication, promising the bishop that he would endeavour to procure him ample satisfaction. So anxious, indeed, was king Henry for the safety of the soul of his quondam guardian, that he accompanied the bishop in person to the Temple Church; and Matthew Paris declares that the bishop, standing by the tomb in the presence of the king, and in the hearing of many bystanders, pronounced these words: “O William, who lyest here interred, and held fast by the chain of excommunication, if those lands which thou hast unjustly taken away from my church be rendered back to me by the king, or by your heir, or by any of your family, and if due satisfaction be made for the loss and injury I have sustained, I grant you absolution; but if not, I confirm my previous sentence, so that, enveloped in your sins, you stand for evermore condemned to hell!”

The restitution was never made, and the indignant bishop pronounced this further curse, in the words of the Psalmist: “His name shall be rooted out in one generation, and his sons shall be deprived of the blessing, Increase and multiply; some of them shall die a miserable death; their inheritance shall be scattered; and this thou, O king, shall behold in thy lifetime, yea, in the days of thy flourishing youth.” Matthew Paris dwells with great solemnity on the remarkable fulfilment of this dreadful prophecy, and declares that when the oblong portion of the Temple Church was consecrated, the body of the Protector was found entire, sewed up in a bull’s hide, but in a state of putridity, and disgusting in appearance.⁵³⁷

It will be observed that the dates of the burial of the above nobleman, as mentioned by Matthew Paris and other authorities, are as follow: – William Marshall the elder, A. D. 1219; Lord de Ros, A. D. 1227; William Marshall the younger, A. D. 1231; all before the consecration of the oblong portion of the church. Gilbert Marshall, on the other hand, was buried A. D. 1241, the year after that ceremony had taken place. Those, therefore, who suppose that the monumental effigies of the Marshall originally stood in the eastern part of the building, are mistaken.

Amongst the many distinguished persons interred in the Temple Church is William Plantagenet, the fifth son of Henry the Third, who died A. D. 1256, under age.⁵³⁸ The greatest desire was manifested by all classes of persons to be buried in the cemetery of the Templars.

King Henry the Third provided for his own interment in the Temple by a formal instrument couched in the following pious and reverential terms: —

“To all faithful Christians to whom these presents shall come, Henry by the grace of God king of England, lord of Ireland, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, and count of Anjou, salvation. Be it known to all of you, that we, being of sound mind and free judgment, and desiring with pious forethought to extend our regards beyond the passing events of this life, and to determine the place of our sepulture, have, on account of the love we bear to the order and to the brethren of the chivalry of the Temple, given and granted, after this life’s journey has drawn to a close, and we have gone the way of all flesh, our body to God and the blessed Virgin Mary, and to the house of the chivalry of the Temple at London, to be there buried, expecting and hoping that through our Lord and Saviour it will greatly contribute to the salvation of our soul… We desire that our body, when we have departed this life, may be carried to the aforesaid house of the chivalry of the Temple, and be there decently buried as above mentioned… As witness the venerable father R., bishop of Hereford, &c. Given by the hand of the venerable father Edmund, bishop of Chichester, our chancellor, at Gloucester, the 27th of July, in the nineteenth year of our reign.”⁵³⁹

Queen Eleanor also provided in a similar manner for her interment in the Temple Church, the formal instrument being expressed to be made with the consent and approbation of her lord, Henry the illustrious king of England, who had lent a willing ear to her prayers upon the subject.⁵⁴⁰ These sepulchral arrangements, however, were afterwards altered, and the king by his will directed his body to be buried as follows: – “I will that my body be buried in the church of the blessed Edward at Westminster, there being no impediment, having formerly appointed my body to be buried in the New Temple.”⁵⁴¹