CHAPTER VI
The conquest of Jerusalem by the Carizmians – Rise and progress of the Comans – They are defeated and destroyed by the Templars – The exploits of the Templars in Egypt – King Louis of France visits the Templars in Palestine – He assists them in putting the country into a defensible state – Henry III., king of England, visits the Temple at Paris – The magnificent hospitality of the Templars in England and France – Bendocdar, sultan of Egypt, invades Palestine – He defeats the Templars, takes their strong fortresses, and decapitates six hundred of their brethren – The Grand Master comes to England for succour – The renewal of the war – The fall of Acre – The Templars establish their head-quarters in the island of Cyprus – Their alliance with the king of Persia – The reconquest of Jerusalem – The desolation of the Holy Land – The final extinction of the Templars in Palestine.
“The Knights of the Temple ever maintained their fearless and fanatic character; if they neglected to live, they were prepared to die in the service of Christ.” —Gibbon.
Shortly after the recovery of the holy city, (A. D. 1242,) Djemal’eddeen, the Mussulman, paid a visit to Jerusalem. “I saw,” says he, “the monks and the priests masters of the Temple of the Lord. I saw the vials of wine prepared for the sacrifice. I entered into the Mosque Al Acsa, (the Temple of the Knights Templars, ante, p. 12,) and I saw a bell suspended from the dome. The rites and ceremonies of the Mussulmen were abolished; the call to prayer was no longer heard. The infidels publicly exercised their idolatrous practices in the sanctuaries of the Mussulmen.”116 By the advice of Benedict, bishop of Marseilles, who came to the holy city on a pilgrimage, the Templars rebuilt their ancient and once formidable castle of Saphet, the dilapidated ruins of which had been ceded to them by their recent treaty with Saleh Ismael. During a pilgrimage to the lake of Tiberias and the banks of the Jordan, the bishop of Marseilles had halted at Saphet, and spent a night amid the ruins of the ancient castle, where he found a solitary Knight Templar keeping watch in a miserable hovel. Struck with the position of the place, and its importance in a military point of view, he sought on his return to Acre an interview with the Grand Master of the Temple, and urged him to restore the castle of Saphet to its pristine condition. The bishop was invited to attend a general chapter of the order of the Temple, when the matter was discussed, and it was unanimously determined that the mountain of Saphet should immediately be refortified. The bishop himself laid the first stone, and animated the workmen by a spirited oration. Eight hundred and fifty masons and artificers, and four hundred slaves, were employed in the task. During the first thirty months after the commencement of operations, the Templars expended eleven thousand golden bezants upon the works, and in succeeding years they spent upwards of forty thousand. The walls, when finished, were sixty French feet in width, one hundred and seventy in height, and the circuit of them was two thousand two hundred and fifty feet. They were flanked by seven large round towers, sixty feet in diameter, and seventy-two feet higher than the walls. The fosse surrounding the fortress was thirty-six feet wide, and was pierced in the solid rock to a depth of forty-three feet. The garrison in time of peace amounted to one thousand seven hundred men, and to two thousand two hundred in time of war. Twelve thousand mule loads of corn and barley were consumed annually within the walls of the fortress; and in addition to all the ordinary expenses and requirements of the establishment, the Templars maintained a well-furnished table and excellent accommodation for all way-worn pilgrims and travellers. “The generous expenditure of the Templars at this place,” says a cotemporary historian, “renders them truly worthy of the liberality and largesses of the faithful.”117
The ruins of this famous castle, crowning the summit of a lofty mountain, torn and shattered by earthquakes, still present a stupendous appearance. In Pocock’s time “two particularly fine large round towers” were entire: and Van Egmont and Heyman give the following account of the condition of the fortress at the period of their visit. “The next place that engaged our attention was the citadel, which is the greatest object of curiosity in Saphet, and is generally considered one of the most ancient structures remaining in the country. In order to form some idea of this fortification in its present state, imagine a lofty mountain, and on its summit a round castle, with walls of incredible thickness, and with a corridor or covered passage extending round the walls, and ascended by a winding staircase. The thickness of the walls and corridor together was twenty paces. The whole was of hewn stone, and some of the stones are eight or nine spans in length… This castle was anciently surrounded with stupendous works, as appears from the remains of two moats lined with free-stone, several fragments of walls, bulwarks, towers, &c., all very solid and strongly built; and below these moats other massive works, having corridors round them in the same manner as the castle; so that any person, on surveying these fortifications, may wonder how so strong a fortress could ever be taken.” Amongst the various interesting remains of this castle, these intelligent travellers describe “a large structure of free-stone in the form of a cupola or dome. The stones, which are almost white, are of astonishing magnitude, some being twelve spans in length and five in thickness. The inside is full of niches for placing statues, and near each niche is a small cell. An open colonnade extends quite round the building, and, like the rest of the structure, is very massive and compact.”118
When the sultan of Egypt had been informed of the march of the Templars to Jerusalem, and the re-possession by the military friars of the holy places and sanctuaries of the Mussulmen, he sent an army of several thousand men across the desert, to drive them out of the Holy City before they had time to repair the fortifications and re-construct the walls. The Templars assembled all their forces and advanced to meet the Egyptians. They occupied the passes and defiles of the hill country leading to Jerusalem, and gained a glorious victory over the Moslems, driving the greater part of them into the desert. Ayoub, sultan of Egypt, finding himself unable to resist the formidable alliance of the Templars with Saleh Ismael, called in to his assistance the fierce pastoral tribes of the Carizmians. These were a warlike race of people, who had been driven from their abodes, in the neighbourhood of the Caspian, by the successful arms of the Moguls, and had rushed headlong upon the weak and effeminate nations of the south. They had devastated and laid waste Armenia and the north-western parts of Persia, cutting off by the sword, or dragging away into captivity, all who had ventured to oppose their progress. For years past they had been leading a migratory, wandering life, exhausting the resources of one district, and then passing onwards into another, without making any fixed settlement, or having any regular places of abode, and their destructive progress has been compared by the Arabian writers to the wasting tempest or the terrible inundation. The rude hardships of their roving life had endowed them with a passive endurance which enabled them to surmount all obstacles, and to overcome every difficulty. Their clothing consisted of a solitary sheep’s skin, or a wolf’s skin, tied around their loins; boiled herbs and some water, or a little milk, sufficed them for food and beverage; their arms were the bow and the lance; and they shed the blood of their fellow-creatures with the same indifference as they would that of the beasts of the field. Their wives and their children accompanied their march, braving all dangers and fatigues; their tents were their homes, and the site of their encampment their only country. Nothing could exceed the terror inspired in Armenia and Persia by the military expeditions of these rude and ferocious shepherds of the Caspian, who were the foes of all races and of all people, and manifested a profound indifference for every religion.
The Carizmians were encamped on the left bank of the Euphrates, pasturing their cavalry in the neighbouring plains, when their chief, Barbeh Khan, received a deputation from the sultan of Egypt, inviting their co-operation and assistance in the reduction of Palestine. Their cupidity was awakened by an exaggerated account of the fertility and the wealth of the land, and they were offered a settlement in the country as soon as it was rescued from the hands of the Franks. The messengers displayed the written letters of the sultan of Egypt; they presented to the Carizmian chief some rich shawls and magnificent presents, and returned to their master at Grand Cairo with promises of speedy support. The Carizmians assembled together in a body; they crossed the Euphrates (A. D. 1244) in small leathern boats, ravaged the territories of the sultan of Aleppo, and marched up the plain of the Orontes to Hems, wasting all the country around them with fire and the sword. The intelligence of these events reached the Grand Master of the Temple when he was busily engaged in rebuilding the vast and extensive fortifications of the Holy City. A council of war was called together, and it was determined that Jerusalem was untenable, and that the Holy City must once again be abandoned to the infidels. The Hospitallers in their black mantles, and the Templars in their white habits, were drawn up in martial array in the streets of Jerusalem, and the weeping Christians were exhorted once again to leave their homes and avail themselves of the escort and protection of the military friars to Jaffa. Many gathered together their little property and quitted the devoted city, and many lingered behind amid the scenes they loved and cherished. Soon, however, frightful reports reached Jerusalem of the horrors of the Carizmian invasion, and the fugitives, who had fled with terror and astonishment from their destructive progress, spread alarm and consternation throughout the whole land. Several thousand Christians, who had remained behind, then attempted to make their escape, with their wives and children, through the mountains to the plain of Ramleh and the sea-coast, relying on the truce and treaty of alliance which had been established with Nasser Daoud, lord of Carac, and the mountaineers. But the inhabitants of the mountain region, being a set of lawless robbers and plunderers, attacked and pillaged them. Some were slain, and others were dragged away into captivity. A few fled back to Jerusalem, and the residue, after having been hunted through the mountains, descended into the plain of Ramleh, where they were attacked by the Carizmians, and only three hundred out of the whole number succeeded in reaching Jaffa in safety. All the women and children had been taken captive in the mountains, and amongst them were several holy nuns, who were sent to Egypt and sold in the common slave-markets.
The Carizmians had advanced into the plain of Ramleh by way of Baalbec, Tiberias, and Naplous, and they now directed their footsteps towards Jerusalem. They entered the Holy City sword in hand, massacred the few remaining Christians in the church of the Holy Sepulchre, pillaged the town, and rifled the tombs of the kings for treasure. They then marched upon Gaza, stormed the city, and put the garrison to the sword, after which they sent messengers across the desert to the sultan of Egypt to announce their arrival. Ayoub immediately sent a robe of honour and sumptuous gifts to their chief, and despatched his army from Cairo in all haste, under the command of Rokmeddin Bibars, one of his principal Mamlooks, to join them before Gaza. The Grand Masters of the Temple and the Hospital, on the other hand, collected their forces together, and made a junction with the troops of the sultan of Damascus and the lord of Carac. They marched upon Gaza, attacked the united armies of the Egyptians and Carizmians, and were exterminated in a bloody battle of two days’ continuance. The Grand Master of the Temple and the flower of his chivalry perished in that bloody encounter, and the Grand Master of the Hospital was taken prisoner, and led away into captivity.119
The government of the order of the Temple, in consequence of the death of the Grand Master, temporarily devolved upon the Knight Templar, Brother William de Rochefort, who immediately despatched a melancholy letter addressed to the pope and the archbishop of Canterbury, detailing the horrors and atrocities of the Carizmian invasion. “These perfidious savages,” says he, “having penetrated within the gates of the holy city of Israel, the small remnant of the faithful left therein, consisting of children, women, and old men, took refuge in the church of the sepulchre of our Lord. The Carizmians rushed to that holy sanctuary; they butchered them all before the very sepulchre itself, and cutting off the heads of the priests who were kneeling with uplifted hands before the altars, they said one to another, ‘Let us here shed the blood of the Christians on the very place where they offer up wine to their God, who they say was hanged here.’ Moreover, in sorrow be it spoken, and with sighs we inform you, that laying their sacrilegious hands on the very sepulchre itself, they sadly knocked it about, utterly battering to pieces the marble shrine which was built around that holy sanctuary. They have defiled, with every abomination of which they were capable, Mount Calvary, where Christ was crucified, and the whole church of the resurrection. They have taken away, indeed, the sculptured columns which were placed as a decoration before the sepulchre of the Lord; and, as a mark of victory, and as a taunt to the Christians, they have sent them to the sepulchre of the wicked Mahomet. They have violated the tombs of the happy kings of Jerusalem in the same church, and they have scattered, to the hurt of Christendom, the ashes of those holy men to the winds, irreverently profaning the revered Mount Sion. The Temple of the Lord, the church of the Valley of Jehoshaphat, where the Virgin lies buried, the church of Bethlehem, and the place of the nativity of our Lord, they have polluted with enormities too horrible to be related, far exceeding the iniquity of all the Saracens, who, though they frequently occupied the land of the Christians, yet always reverenced and preserved the holy places…” The subsequent military operations are then described; the march of the Templars and Hospitallers, on the 4th of October, A. D. 1244, from Acre to Cæsarea; the junction of their forces with those of the Moslem sultans; the retreat of the Carizmians to Gaza, where they received succour from the sultan of Egypt; and the preparation of the Hospitallers and Templars for the attack before that place. “Those holy warriors,” say they, “boldly rushed in upon the enemy, but the Saracens who had joined us, having lost many of their men, fled, and the warriors of the cross were left alone to withstand the united attack of the Egyptians and Carizmians. Like stout champions of the Lord, and true defenders of catholicity, whom the same faith and the same cross and passion make true brothers, they bravely resisted; but as they were few in number in comparison with the enemy, they at last succumbed, so that of the convents of the house of the chivalry of the Temple, and of the house of the hospital of St. John at Jerusalem, only thirty-three Templars and twenty-six Hospitallers escaped; the archbishop of Tyre, the bishop of St. George, the abbot of St. Mary of Jehoshaphat, and the Master of the Temple, with many other clerks and holy men, being slain in that sanguinary fight. We ourselves, having by our sins provoked this dire calamity, fled half dead to Ascalon; from thence we proceeded by sea to Acre, and found that city and the adjoining province filled with sorrow and mourning, misery and death. There was not a house or a family that had not lost an inmate or a relation…
“The Carizmians have now pitched their tents in the plain of Acre, about two miles from the city. They have spread themselves over the whole face of the country as far as Nazareth and Saphet. They have slaughtered or driven away the house-holders, occupied their houses, and divided their property amongst them. They have appointed bailiffs and tax-gatherers in the towns and villages, and they compel the countrymen and the villeins of the soil to pay to themselves the rents and tribute which they have heretofore been wont to pay to the Christians, so that the church of Jerusalem and the christian kingdom have now no territory, except a few fortifications, which are defended with great difficulty and labour by the Templars and Hospitallers… To you, dear Father, upon whom the burthen of the defence of the cause of Christ justly resteth, we have caused these sad tidings to be communicated, earnestly beseeching you to address your prayers to the throne of grace, imploring mercy from the Most High; that he who consecrated the Holy Land with his own blood in redemption of all mankind, may compassionately turn towards it and defend it, and send it succour. But know, assuredly, that unless, through the interposition of the Most High, or by the aid of the faithful, the Holy Land is succoured in the next spring passage from Europe, its doom is sealed, and utter ruin is inevitable. Given at Acre, this fifth day of November, in the year of our Lord one thousand two hundred and forty-four.”120
The above letter was read before a general council of the church, which had been assembled at Lyons by pope Innocent IV., and it was resolved that a new crusade should be preached. It was provided that those who assumed the cross should assemble at particular places to receive the pope’s blessing; that there should be a truce for four years between all christian princes; that during all that time there should be no tournaments, feasts, nor public rejoicings; that all the faithful in Christ should be exhorted to contribute, out of their fortunes and estates, to the defence of the Holy Land; and that ecclesiastics should pay towards it the tenth, and cardinals the twentieth, of all their revenues, for the term of three years successively. The ancient enthusiasm, however, in favour of distant expeditions to the East had died away; the addresses and exhortations of the clergy now fell on unwilling ears, and the Templars and Hospitallers, for several years, received only some small assistance in men and money. The emperor Frederick, who still bore the empty title of king of Jerusalem, made no attempt to save the wreck of his feeble kingdom. His bride, the fair and youthful Violante, queen of the Latin kingdom, had been dead several years, killed by his coldness and neglect; and the emperor bestowed no thought upon his eastern subjects and the Holy Land, except to abuse those by whom that land had been so gallantly defended. In a letter to Richard earl of Cornwall, the brother of Henry the Third, king of England, Frederick accuses the Templars of making war upon the sultan of Egypt, in defiance of a treaty entered into with that monarch, of compelling him to call in the Carizmians to his assistance; and he compares the union of the Templars with the infidel sultan, for purposes of defence, to an attempt to extinguish a fire by pouring upon it a quantity of oil. “The proud religion of the Temple,” says he, in continuation, “nurtured amid the luxuries of the barons of the land, waxeth wanton. It hath been made manifest to us, by certain religious persons lately arrived from parts beyond sea, that the aforesaid sultans and their trains were received with pompous alacrity within the gates of the houses of the Temple, and that the Templars suffered them to perform within them their superstitious rites and ceremonies, with invocation of Mahomet, and to indulge in secular delights.”121 In the midst of all these terrible disasters, a general chapter of Knights Templars was assembled in the Pilgrim’s Castle, and the veteran warrior, Brother William de Sonnac, was chosen (A. D. 1247) Grand Master of the Order.122 Circular mandates were, at the same time, sent to the western preceptories, summoning all the brethren to Palestine, and directing the immediate transmission of all the money in the different treasuries to the head-quarters of the Order at Acre. These calls were promptly attended to, and the pope praises both the Templars and Hospitallers for the zeal and energy displayed by them in sending out the newly admitted knights and novices with armed bands and a large amount of treasure to the succour of the holy territory.
Whilst the proposed crusade was slowly progressing, the holy pontiff wrote to the sultan of Egypt, the ally of the Carizmians, proposing a peace or a truce, and received the following grand and magnificent reply to his communication: – “To the pope, the noble, the great, the spiritual, the affectionate, the holy, the thirteenth of the apostles, the leader of the sons of baptism, the high priest of the Christians, (may God strengthen him and establish him, and give him happiness!) from the most powerful sultan ruling over the necks of nations; wielding the two great weapons, the sword and the pen; possessing two pre-eminent excellencies – that is to say, learning and judgment; king of two seas; ruler of the South and North; king of the region of Egypt and Syria, Mesopotamia, Media, Idumea, and Ophir; king Saloph Beelpheth, Jacob, son of Sultan Kamel, Hemevafar Mehameth, son of Sultan Hadel, Robethre, son of Jacob, whose kingdom may the Lord God make happy.
“In the name of God the most merciful and compassionate. The letters of the pope, the noble, the great, &c., &c., have been presented to us. May God favour him who earnestly seeketh after righteousness and doeth good, and wisheth peace, and walketh in the ways of the Lord. May God assist him who worshippeth him in truth. We have considered the aforesaid letters, and have understood the matters treated of therein, which have pleased and delighted us; and the messenger sent by the holy pope came to us, and we caused him to be brought before us with honour, and love, and reverence; and we brought him to see us face to face, and inclining our ears towards him, we listened to his speech, and we have put faith in the words he hath spoken unto us concerning Christ, upon whom be salvation and praise. But we know more concerning that same Christ than ye know, and we magnify him more than ye magnify him. And as to what you say concerning your desire for peace, tranquillity, and quiet, and that you wish to put down war, so also do we; we desire and wish nothing to the contrary. But let the pope know, that between ourselves and the emperor (Frederick) there hath been mutual love, and alliance, and perfect concord, from the time of the sultan, my father, (whom may God preserve and place in the glory of his brightness!) and between you and the emperor there is, as ye know, strife and warfare; whence it is not fit that we should enter into any treaty with the Christians until we have previously had his advice and assent. We have therefore written to our envoy at the imperial court upon the propositions made to us by the pope’s messenger, &c… This letter was written on the seventh of the month Maharan. Praise be to the one only God, and may his blessing rest upon our master, Mahomet.”123
In the course of a few years the Carizmians were annihilated. The sultan of Egypt having no further need of their services, left them to perish in the lands they had wasted. They were attacked by the sultans of Aleppo and Hems, and were pursued with equal fury by Moslems and by Christians. Several large bodies of them were cut up in detail by the Templars and Hospitallers, and they were at last slain to a man. Their very name perished from the face of the earth, but the traces of their existence were long preserved in the ruin and desolation they had spread around them.124 The Holy Land, although happily freed from the destructive presence of these barbarians, had yet everything to fear from the powerful sultan of Egypt, with whom hostilities still continued; and Brother William de Sonnac, the Grand Master of the Temple, for the purpose of stimulating the languid energies of the English nation, and reviving their holy zeal and enthusiasm in the cause of the cross, despatched a distinguished Knight Templar to England, charged with the duty of presenting to king Henry the Third a magnificent crystal vase, containing, as it was alleged, a portion of the blood of Jesus Christ!
A solemn attestation of the genuineness of this precious relic, signed by the patriarch of Jerusalem, and the bishops, abbots, and barons of the Holy Land, was forwarded to London, and was deposited, together with the vase and its contents, in the cathedral church of St. Paul. The king ordered the bishops and clergy devoutly and reverently to assemble at St. Paul’s, on the anniversary of the translation of St. Edward the Confessor, in full canonicals, with banners, crosses, and lighted wax-candles. On the eve of that day, according to the monk of St. Albans, who personally assisted at the ceremony, “our lord the king, with a devout and contrite spirit, as became that most christian prince, fasting on bread and water, and watching all night with a great light, and performing many pious exercises, prudently prepared himself for the morrow’s solemnity.” On the morrow a procession of bishops, monks, and priests, having been duly marshalled and arranged, king Henry made his appearance upon the steps at the south door of St. Paul’s cathedral, and receiving with “the greatest honour, and reverence, and fear, the little vase containing the memorable treasure, he bore it publicly through the streets of London, holding it aloft just above his face. Bareheaded, and clothed in a humble habit, he walked afoot without halting, to Westminster Abbey; and although he passed over rough and uneven pavements, yet he invariably kept his eyes stedfastly fixed, either on heaven or on that vase.” He made a solemn procession round the Abbey, then round the palace at Westminster, and then round his own bed-chamber, all the while unweariedly bearing aloft the precious relic, after which he presented it to God, and the church of St. Peter, to his dear Edward, and the sacred convent at Westminster.125
In the mean time the Comans, another fierce pastoral tribe of wandering Tartars, made their way through the christian province of Armenia into the principality of Antioch, and ravaged both banks of the Orontes, carrying away the inhabitants into captivity. The king of Armenia and the prince of Antioch despatched messengers to the Templars and Hospitallers for succour; and the Grand Masters, collecting all their disposable forces, hurried to the relief of the distressed provinces. In a long and bloody battle, fought in the neighbourhood of the iron bridge over the Orontes, the Comans were overthrown and slaughtered, and the vast and wealthy city of Antioch was saved from pillage. The Hospitallers suffered severe loss in this engagement, and Brother Bertrand de Comps, their Grand Master, died of his wounds four days after the battle.
In the month of June, A. D. 1249, the galleys of the Templars left Acre with all their disposable forces on board, under the command of the Grand Master William de Sonnac, and joined the great French expedition of Louis king of France which had been directed against the infidels in Egypt. After the capture of Damietta, the following letter was forwarded by Brother William de Sonnac to the Master of the Temple at London: – “Brother William de Sonnac, by the grace of God Master of the poor chivalry of the Temple, to his beloved brother in Christ, Robert de Sanford, Preceptor of England, salvation through the Lord. We hasten to unfold to you by these presents, agreeable and happy intelligence… (He details the landing of the French, the defeat of the infidels with the loss of one christian soldier, and the subsequent capture of the city.) Damietta, therefore, has been taken, not by our deserts, nor by the might of our armed bands, but through the divine power and assistance. Moreover, be it known to you that king Louis, with God’s favour, proposes to march upon Alexandria or Cairo for the purpose of delivering our brethren there detained in captivity, and of reducing, with God’s help, the whole land to the christian worship. Farewell.”126
The Lord de Joinville, the friend of king Louis, and one of the bravest of the French captains, gives a lively and most interesting account of the campaign, and of the exploits of the Templars. During the march towards Cairo, they led the van of the christian army, and on one occasion, when the king of France had given strict orders that no attack should be made upon the infidels, and that an engagement should be avoided, a body of Turkish cavalry advanced against them. “One of these Turks,” says Joinville, “gave a Knight Templar in the first rank so heavy a blow with his battle-axe, that it felled him under the feet of the Lord Reginald de Vichier’s horse, who was Marshal of the Temple; the Marshal, seeing his man fall, cried out to his brethren, ‘At them in the name of God, for I cannot longer stand this.’ He instantly stuck spurs into his horse, followed by all his brethren, and as their horses were fresh, not a Saracen escaped.” After marching for some days, the Templars arrived on the banks of the Tanitic branch of the Nile, (the ancient Pelusiac mouth of the river,) and found the sultan encamped with his entire force on the opposite side, to prevent and oppose their passage. King Louis attempted to construct a bridge to enable him to cross the stream, and long and earnestly did the Templars labour at the task, “but,” says Joinville, “as fast as we advanced our bridge the Saracens destroyed it; they dug, on their side of the river, wide and deep holes in the earth, and as the water recoiled from our bridge it filled these holes with water, and tore away the bank, so that what we had been employed on for three weeks or a month they ruined in one or two days.” To protect the soldiers employed upon the construction of the bridge large wooden towers were erected, and chas chateils or covered galleries, and the infidels exerted all their energies to destroy them with the terrible Greek fire. “At night,” says Joinville, “they brought forward an engine called by them La Perriere, a dreadful engine to do mischief, and they flung from it such quantities of Greek fire that it was the most horrible sight ever witnessed… This Greek fire was like a large tun, and its tail was of the length of a long spear; the noise which it made was like to thunder, and it seemed a great dragon of fire flying through the air, giving so great a light with its flame, that we saw in our camp as clearly as in broad day.”