A History of the Crusades

by Jonathan Riley-Smith

  At all levels, therefore, officials were counterbalanced by chapters. On some issues, such as the admission of recruits, there was often a requirement that decisions should be taken at chapter meetings, and it also became the norm for several other types of business to be transacted there. Central and provincial chapters were occasions when dues were paid and accounts rendered. In some orders the latter obligation was linked with a periodic surrender of offices: appointments were therefore also commonly made at chapter meetings. Yet officials in practice enjoyed a considerable freedom of action, and were not dominated by their subordinates. Provincial and general chapters met only infrequently, and lacked continuity of membership; and not all chapters had seals of their own. Even when checks did exist, there seems to have been little desire to shackle officials too rigidly. It was usually only when there had been persistent misconduct that subordinates stepped in, as happened in the Hospital in 1296, when the central convent sought to remedy abuses perpetrated by a series of recent masters. The vow of obedience perhaps exercised a restraining influence on subordinates, but it should be remembered that in the secular world there was a similar reluctance to impose permanent restrictions on rulers.

  Officials did not, on the other hand, always find it easy to maintain close supervision over all their subordinates. Masters of the leading military orders were seeking to exercise authority throughout western Christendom, and in orders based in the Holy Land the situation was made more difficult by the fact that their headquarters were not in a central position geographically. Visitation became a customary practice in all the bigger orders; yet, although heads of provinces could carry out this task in person, masters of orders usually had to act through delegates. There was obviously the possibility of a trend towards provincial independence, especially as most brothers were natives of the district where they resided, and there was a danger that local ties and loyalties would take precedence over obedience to the master. Yet, although provinces sometimes defaulted on their financial obligations, the only serious attempt to achieve greater provincial independence before 1300 was that made at the end of the thirteenth century by brethren of Santiago in Portugal: with the support of the Portuguese king, they succeeded in reducing the master’s authority over them.

  Convents of clerics or of sisters, unlike those in which lay brethren predominated, often had the right to elect their own head; and lay brothers were, of course, subject in spiritual matters to their priestly colleagues. But the government of military orders rested mainly in the hands of brethren who were lay brothers, and at the upper levels in the hands of knightly brothers. Leading central officials and heads of provinces usually belonged to the rank of knight, and knights were certainly the largest group at the Temple’s central convent, where the day-today business of the order was conducted. They were also the largest element in general chapters, and in the Temple and Teutonic Order are known to have predominated in the committees which elected new masters, for these consisted of eight knights, four sergeants and one chaplain. At the more local level, knights were usually in charge of convents belonging to the leading orders in frontier regions, but in other areas of western Christendom commanders were often sergeants, and they sometimes had knights among their subordinates. In these regions, appointments seem to have been determined by suitability for a post, rather than rank. Chapters of local convents were also made up largely of sergeants, as the latter comprised the largest group in areas away from Christian frontiers. The roles assigned to the various ranks did not always make for harmony, but the only prolonged dissensions between ranks seem to have been those in Santiago and Calatrava, where clerics repeatedly complained of encroachment on their rights, and in the Hospital, where the sisters of Sigena in Aragon clashed on a number of occasions with the head of their province.

  Military orders did not have complete control over their own affairs. Although most enjoyed the privilege of exemption and were thus freed from episcopal jurisdiction, they remained subject to papal authority, and popes intervened when they considered that there was a need for correction. There was also occasional papal interference in appointments to offices in military orders: this happened either for political reasons or because a pope wished to favour a protégé. Intervention of this kind was also practised by kings, and for the same reasons, while the dispatch of responsions to the Holy Land was on occasion hindered by secular rulers in the West. Military orders which were affiliated to other religious foundations were, however, subject to more regular external supervision. Several Spanish orders, including Calatrava, Montegaudio, and Santa María de España, were affiliated to the Cistercians, while Avis and Alcántara became affiliated to Calatrava. The reasons for these arrangements are not always known, although in the case of Calatrava affiliation is to be explained by the circumstances of the order’s foundation: it was established after the Cistercian abbot of Fitero had accepted responsibility for the defence of the castle of Calatrava in 1158, when the Templars could no longer hold it. The relationship which was established was similar to that which obtained between Cistercian houses, with the head of the mother house having the right of visitation, and a role in the election of masters. Yet most military orders were in theory subject only to the pope.

  Conventual Life

  Recruits to military orders took the normal monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience—the exception was Santiago, which admitted married men to full membership—and they were expected to live a coenobitic form of life within a convent, sleeping in a dormitory and eating in a refectory. All brothers resident in convents were obliged to attend services but, since many were illiterate, they were merely expected to listen as chaplains recited offices, and to say a certain number of paternosters for each of the canonical hours. The periods between services were taken up by practical pursuits. Meditative reading was not expected of lay brethren; and although literary activity was not entirely lacking in the military orders, the only books found in most Templar convents at the time of the Templar trial were those needed for the conduct of services. Administration and charitable work occupied some brethren, while sergeants often performed household or agricultural tasks. Little is known, however, of the military training and exercises undertaken during periods of peace. Rules and regulations were merely concerned to ensure that activities characteristic of secular knighthood, such as hunting and hawking, were shunned. In the words of the Templar Rule, ‘it is not appropriate for a religious order to indulge in this way in worldly pleasures’, although in waste lands brethren of Calatrava were allowed to eat animals they had hunted. Unlike monks, members of military orders were in fact permitted to eat meat, though usually on only three days a week. The fasts to which they were subjected were also less rigorous than in monasteries, and additional fasting without permission was prohibited. Although—except in the Baltic—the main periods of fasting did not coincide with the campaigning season, and although only a minority of brethren were actually engaged in warfare, the concern was to ensure that brethren were strong enough to fight. As in monasteries, silence was normally to be observed at mealtimes, although the Templar Rule did accept that ignorance of sign-language might necessitate some talking during meals. In the matter of clothing the Templar Rule also made a concession by allowing linen, instead of wool, to be worn between Easter and All Saints because of the Syrian heat. But simplicity was to be maintained in clothing and equipment, and extravagance avoided.

  Graded schemes of penalties were devised to punish those who contravened regulations, with sentences ranging from expulsion to merely a few days’ penance, sometimes accompanied by a beating. Yet decrees could not prevent breaches of discipline, and there were also some permitted relaxations of observance. The common life was not maintained in its entirety. There is a growing number of references to rooms or quarters belonging to individual officials, and by the beginning of the fourteenth century ordinary brothers at the Hospital’s headquarters at Limassol appear to have been occupying cells or rooms of thei
r own. References to dormitories—both in leading and in smaller houses—are, however, encountered in the records of the Templar trial. There were also some permitted relaxations of food regulations: these were sometimes, though not always, justified by military needs. Rules concerning dress and equipment were not relaxed, but were difficult to enforce. Thirteenth-century Hospitaller statutes, for example, contain repeated condemnations of embroidered clothing and of gold and silver on equipment. Nor were restrictions on hunting uniformly observed.

  The enforcement of a strict regime of life in military orders was often hindered by the absence of a novitiate, which would have allowed both a postulant and those who received him to assess his suitability for the religious life, and which would also have provided an opportunity for instruction. Although Calatrava continued to insist on a probationary period, by the mid-thirteenth century recruits to the Teutonic Order could be admitted without a novitiate, and in the Temple it disappeared altogether. Even when there was no probationary period, however, orders did seek to provide some instruction: in the Temple this was first undertaken at the end of the admission ceremony, when the recruit was told of the penalties for various offences and given details about the daily routine. Yet for the recruit this could not have been a very effective way of learning and, although in the Temple, as in other orders, there were periodic public readings of regulations, the records of the Templar trial in the early fourteenth century reveal widespread ignorance and inaccurate knowledge among brethren. Very varied assessments were given, for example, about the number of paternosters to be said for each office. The absence of a novitiate, together with the illiteracy of many brothers, inevitably created special problems; but declining standards were a common phenomenon throughout the monastic world.

  Critics and Changing Roles

  Although the flow of donations was maintained until well into the thirteenth century, and recruits to the leading orders continued to come forward, the military orders became subjected during the course of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries to a widening range of criticism. The doubts which had been expressed when the institution first emerged were echoed by some later writers, but the orders were increasingly attacked on other grounds. They were commonly accused of both pride and avarice. But there was also growing censure of the uses to which the orders put their wealth. Some critics argued that brethren lived a life of ease and luxury, and that they devoted their revenues to this end. It was held that, in consequence, the orders were not maintaining as many knights in frontier regions, especially the Holy Land, as they should: among those who voiced this argument were the St Albans’ chronicler Matthew Paris in his Chronica majora and the dean of Lincoln at the Council of Lyons in 1274. Brethren who did reside in frontier regions were blamed for a readiness to use force against fellow Christians. This complaint was frequently made of the Teutonic Order in the Baltic region, and it was also claimed more widely that the orders, especially the Templars and Hospitallers, were turning their weapons on each other because of the bitter rivalry which was thought to exist between them. Rivalry was further seen to hamper fruitful co-operation in battle. Effective military action against Muslims in the East was also thought to be hindered by the independence enjoyed by the orders, while another claim was that military orders in the eastern Mediterranean region were reluctant to pursue aggressive policies towards the infidel. When, for example, the Templars and Hospitallers counselled against attacking Jerusalem during the Third Crusade, they incurred the censure of French crusaders. They were in fact thought by some to be on rather too friendly terms with the Muslims. On the other hand, the English Franciscan Roger Bacon in the 1260s criticized them for fighting at all. His argument, which was one of expediency, was that their military activities impeded the conversion of the infidel. This was clearly a minority view, but the Swordbrethren and the Teutonic Order in the Baltic region were on various occasions criticized for not furthering conversion and for adopting policies which hindered it.

  Such criticisms must obviously be seen in context. All religious orders had their detractors. Nor were all who commented on the military orders uniformly critical: these institutions had their defenders, even among those who were at times ready to pass censure. Popes expressed criticism, but they also supported the orders throughout the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Some critics were clearly biased. The secular clergy lost income and authority as a result of the privileges granted to the orders by the papacy, and in the thirteenth century they were also repeatedly being asked to contribute to taxes in aid of the Holy Land. In the Baltic region many detractors were rivals of the Teutonic Order. Some of the orders’ opponents were, moreover, not basing their comments on personal experience, but merely repeating what had become the conventional view. Many critics were also ill-informed and had only a limited understanding of the orders’ position. They had an exaggerated notion of the military orders’ resources, and therefore assumed that these orders should have no difficulty in financing the defence of the Holy Land. But inventories drawn up during the Templar trial reveal few signs of affluence. The extent of rivalry was similarly exaggerated. Complaints about the orders’ policies towards the infidel in the Holy Land are to be explained partly by misconceptions and differences of outlook. Crusaders often lacked a clear understanding of the political circumstances in the East and did not comprehend where the interests of the Latin settlements lay in the long term; they had come to fight the infidel and favoured aggressive policies, without thought for the future.

  Yet not all criticism was unfair. The orders did at times abuse privileges; and the use of arms against fellow Christians could not always be justified by the argument of self-defence, while the Teutonic Order’s determination to assert its independence first in Hungary and then in Prussia suggests that it was concerned not merely with furthering the struggle against the infidel.

  Towards the end of the thirteenth century the military orders were thought by many to be in need of major reform. The ecclesiastical authorities, as well as the authors of crusading treatises, devoted considerable attention to the matter. Some suggested that the orders’ independence in the eastern Mediterranean region should be curbed, but more frequently it was argued that, to avoid rivalry, some or all of the military orders should be amalgamated. This view was advanced by many theorists, such as Raymond Lull and Peter Dubois, and also by the provincial councils which were summoned to consider the issue by Pope Nicholas IV in 1291. In some of these councils it was also advocated that the orders’ resources should be assessed to discover how many knights could be maintained from their lands. Peter Dubois, however, was of the opinion that their properties in the West should be confiscated and used in other ways for crusading purposes.

  Although some theorists looked forward to a future when a single military order would assume the leadership of the Christian cause in the eastern Mediterranean, the proposed reforms were not implemented. Change resulted instead from altered circumstances in frontier regions. It took place most gradually in Spain, where the Reconquista had come to a halt in the mid-thirteenth century. The emphasis shifted towards involvement in conflicts between Christians. Spanish rulers came to expect military orders to give service against their Christian rivals, as happened when the French invaded Aragon in 1285; and in Castile the orders were caught up in the internal struggles of the later thirteenth century. In the eastern Mediterranean, the collapse of the Latin settlements in 1291 might seem to provide a clearer turning point; but the losses of that year did not immediately destroy the orders’ raison d’être, for it was not apparent to contemporaries that the Holy Land had been lost for good. The Templars and Hospitallers, together with St Thomas of Acre, moved their headquarters to Cyprus, which was only 100 miles from the Syrian coast, and in the following years several expeditions against Islam were launched from there, while Templar and Hospitaller masters entered the current discussions about the best way of recovering the Holy Land. Yet the Hospitallers encountered problems in Cyprus,
and in the first decade of the fourteenth century created a new role for themselves by conquering the island of Rhodes, off the south-west coast of Asia Minor. Apparently in the meantime the order of St Lazarus transferred its headquarters to France, where it no longer had a military role, while the master and convent of the Teutonic Order established themselves in Venice. But in 1309 the headquarters of the Teutonic Order were moved again to Marienburg in Prussia, and from that date the order’s interests became centred in the Baltic region.