Temple Church London

  Temple Church is the only commanderie in England we have ever visited. Unlike in France, they aren’t so thick on the ground. Only guessing, but the lack of surviving commanderies may be a product of the way their lands were parceled out after the fall of the order, combined with the Reformation, which destroyed many, if not most, religious sites throughout Britain. The Templars in England were disbanded but were allowed to continue living, which is one of the significant differences between what happened to the Templars in England as compared to in France. Initially, the London Templars met at a location that had once been a Roman temple. But because of the rapid growth of the order since its founding in England in 1128, by the 1160s the site was too small, and the Templars established a larger Read more…

Edward I and the Crown of France

King Edward as a historical figure looms large over my books, both the After Cilmeri series and my new book, Crouchback. Because in the middle ages, the King of England was also the Duke of Aquitaine, not to mention Norman, Edward had ties to France even before he became king. “France”, however, didn’t exist as we know it today, in that Aquitaine was a separate kingdom and the people there were not “French.” Aquitaine had come under the auspices of the kings of England after the marriage of King Henry II to Eleanor of Aquitaine in the late 12th century, as an addition to Henry’s already extensive “French” estates, which included Brittany and Normandy. Over the next century, the Kingdom of France wrested all but Aquitaine away from the Kings of England. Thus, when Edward left for Crusade from Aigues Read more…

The Kings of France: Louis and Philippe

The Kings of France in the 13th century, namely King Louis and his grandson, Philippe, between them ruled France with an iron hand. Both sought to centralize power within themselves while expanding the borders of their kingdom. In the process, they built extensive fortresses throughout the country, started wars, and in the case of Philippe, expelled the Jewish community from France, destroyed the Templars, and assassinated a pope. During our recent visit to France, we visited numerous monuments to their respective rule, including Aigues Mortes, Carcasonne, and Sainte-Chapelle on the Ile de La Cite in Paris. Although Charlemagne built a tower at Aigues Mortes, the founding of the city dates to 1240 during the rule of King Louis. At the time, Louis had no port on the Mediterranean, so to gain access, he did a land exchange with the Church Read more…

The Templar Order

The Templars were formed in 1118, when nine knights took holy vows to defend Jerusalem. In 1128, their founder received a blessing from the pope to formally form a new order of warrior knights. They adopted the order of St. Benedict and the white robes of the Cistercians and began recruiting. Men flocked to join, and were accepted in a hierarchical system of knights, sergeants (who wore black robes), farmers, and chaplains. Within fifty years, the order became one of the largest landowners not only in the Holy Land but in France and England. They became money lenders in the major cities, and were one of the finest fighting forces in the world. On the way to accumulating land, wealth, and the power that came with it, they established monasteries throughout Europe, called commanderies. We visited five such commanderies on Read more…

The Fall of the Templars

Other than a few unsuccessful raids on the Syrian and Egyptian coasts, after 1291, the Templar Order deteriorated into one of bankers and moneylenders. A series of verbal attacks was launched against all military orders, the Templars in particular, suggesting they no longer had a purpose for existence since they failed to take steps to regain the Holy Land. Nothing came of these attacks until a renegade Templar, Esquiu de Floyrian, made specific charges of blasphemy, idolatry and sodomy against the Order to Philip the Fair (Philip IV) of France.” http://www.mostly-medieval.com/explore/temphist.htm (for previous discussion on the origin of the Templar Order see: https://sarahwoodbury.com/the-knights-templar/ This was the beginning of the end for the Templars.  On Friday the 13th (and this is the reason the day is said to be unlucky, or so I understand), Philip of France arrested all of the Read more…

The Templars and Hospitallers in Wales

The Templars and the Hospitallers made inroads into Wales, though less than in other European countries. In Wales, they are very much associated with the Normans and the Holy Land … not that Welshmen didn’t go on Crusade, because some did, but that the institution didn’t attract much of a following among the native Welsh. “In 1156 the Countess of Warwick gave the Templars the church of Llanmadoc in the Gower, and until the early 1280s they held Templeton in Pembrokeshire – contemporary documents call it “Villa Templar”, “Templars’ village”. William Marshal may have given them the mill they owned outside Pembroke castle, and he may have been the donor who gave them the church of Kemeys Commander on the River Usk. The Templars also owned small parcels of land in Glamorganshire and Gwent. Though founded at the same time Read more…