KNIGHTS OF TEMPLAR

When the Knights Templar or the Order of the Temple were founded in 1118-1119 in Jerusalem, it was a 'poor order' whose primary function was the protection of pilgrims along the main roads between the coast at Jaffa and the inland city of Jerusalem. But an important transformation took place when this nascent Order came under the patronage of St Bernard of Clairvaux, nephew of André de Montbard, one of the founding group of the Templars. Until his conversion at the age of twenty, St Bernard himself had been destined for a knightly career, and when he came to patronize the Knights Templar that Order was imbued with the ideals and convictions of the knightly class of Burgundy. ..

..and YES.. the Templars did possess the Holy Grail!!

It has been generally accepted that, for the first nine years of their existence, the Templars consisted of nine members.

Although it has been widely speculated that the Templars wished to keep it this way to cover their secret mission of digging for buried treasure on the Temple Mount, the simple fact remains that the lifestyle adopted by the Order was not to everyone's taste. As such, the Templars had difficulty in recruiting members to their cause in the early years.

Later owing to the Cistercian abbot, Bernard of Clairvaux's letter that swept through the entire Chritendom, nobles were drawn to the order.Those who were unable to join often gifted the Templars with land and other valuables.

While it is true that the Templars were not permitted, by their rule, to own much of anything personally, there was no such restriction on the Order as a whole.

Over the years the Templars rose from their humble beginnings to become the wealthiest of the Crusading Orders - eventually garnering the favour of the Church and the collective European monarchs.

However, after two centuries of defending the Christian faith, the Order met its demise when Philip IV - motivated by greed - sought to destroy the Templars.

On March 18th, 1314 the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, Jacques de Molay, was burned at the stake.Legends hold that De Molay cursed King Philip and Pope Clement to join him in death within a year - and so they did!

Grand Masters

Within the Templar hierarchy, the Grand Master was absolute ruler of the Order and answerable only to the pope. Although his position was a powerful one, he was still obliged to live by the same Rule of Order that those under him swore to obey. However, the Rule did grant him a fairly extensive entourage:

• 4 horses
• 1 Chaplain Brother
• 1 clerk with 3 horses
• 1 Sergeant Brother with 2 horses
• 1 gentleman valet with 1 horse
• 1 farrier
• 1 Saracen scribe
• 1 turcopole
• 1 cook
• 2 foot soldiers
• 1 turcoman
• 2 knight brothers as companions

They were -

Hugues de Payens
Robert de Craon
Everard des Barres
Bernard de Tremeley
Andrew de Montbard

Bertrand de Blancfort
Philip de Milly (Nablus)
Odo de St Amand
Arnold de Torroja
Gerard de Ridefort

Robert de Sablé
Gilbert Erail
Philip de Plessis
William de Chartres
Peter de Montaigu
Armand de Périgord
Richard de Bures

William de Sonnac
Reginald de Vichiers
Thomas Bérard
William de Beaujeu
Theobald Gaudin

Jacques de Molay

Legends and relics

  The Knights Templar have become associated with legends concerning secrets and mysteries handed down to the select from ancient times. Rumors circulated even during the time of the Templars themselves. Freemasonic writers added their own speculations in the 19th century, and further fictional embellishments have been added in modern movies such as National Treasure and Kingdom of Heaven, best-selling novels such as Ivanhoe and The Da Vinci Code, and video games such as Assassin's Creed, Hellgate: London and Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars.
Many of the Templar legends are connected with the Order's early occupation of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and speculation about what relics the Templars may have found there, such as the Holy Grail or the Ark of the Covenant.That the Templars were in possession of some relics is certain. Many churches still display relics such as the bones of a saint, a scrap of cloth once worn by a holy man, or the skull of a martyr: the Templars did the same. They were documented as having a piece of the True Cross, which the Bishop of Acre carried into battle at the disastrous Horns of Hattin. When the battle was lost, Saladin captured the relic, which was then ransomed back to the Crusaders when the Muslims surrendered the city of Acre in 1191 They also possessed the head of Saint Euphemia of Chalcedon.The subject of relics also came up during the Inquisition of the Templars, as several trial documents refer to the worship of an idol of some type, referred to in some cases as a cat, a bearded head, or in some cases as Baphomet, according to one theory a French misspelling of the name Mahomet (Muhammad).

The supposed idol worship was included in the charges brought against the Templars leading to their arrest in the early fourteenth century.This accusation of idol worship levied against the Templars has also led to the modern belief by some that the Templars practiced witchcraft.

There was particular interest during the Crusader era in the Holy Grail myth, which was quickly associated with the Templars, even in the 12th century. The first Grail romance, the fantasy story Le Conte du Graal, was written in 1180 by Chrétien de Troyes, who came from the same area where the Council of Troyes had officially sanctioned the Templars' Order. In Arthurian legend, the hero of the Grail quest, Sir Galahad (a 13th-century literary invention of monks from St. Bernard's Cistercian Order), was depicted bearing a shield with the cross of Saint George, similar to the Templars' insignia. In a chivalric epic of the period, Parzival, Wolfram von Eschenbach refers to Templars guarding the Grail Kingdom.A legend developed that, since the Templars had their headquarters at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, they must have excavated in search of relics, found the Grail, and then proceeded to keep it in secret and guard it with their lives. However, in the extensive documents of the Templar inquisition there was never a single mention of anything like a Grail relic,let alone its possession by the Templars. In reality, most scholars agree that the story of the Grail was just that, a fiction that began circulating in medieval times.

One legendary artifact that does have some connection with the Templars is the Shroud of Turin. In 1357, the shroud was first publicly displayed by the family of the grandson of Geoffrey de Charney, the Templar who had been burned at the stake with Jacques de Molay in 1314. The artifact's origins are still a matter of controversy. In 1988, a carbon dating analysis concluded that the shroud was made between 1260 and 1390, a span that includes the last half-century of the Templars.Disagreement over the proper dating continues.