These explanations have a few things in common. They all imply that Hugh de Payns was the first of the Templars and that King Baldwin II of Jerusalem was the one to recognize them, either as knights committed to the protection of pilgrims or as a group of religious men who wished to devote their military skill to the defense of the Christian settlements. They also agree that at first the Templars lived at the site the crusaders believed to be the temple of the Holy Sepulcher, the place where Jesus had been buried. It was only after they became a military order that the men moved to the king’s palace, in what was believed to be the Temple of Solomon. They may have shared quarters at the beginning with the Hospitallers, who had been established in the Holy Land since 1070.
The chronicles are unclear on whose idea it was to have an order of men who lived like monks and fought like soldiers. After all, fighting monks? That didn’t make sense. Men who fought had to shed blood; shedding blood was a sin. Monks prayed for the souls of warriors while deploring their violence. The idea was that fighting men were a necessary evil to protect society from the lawless. Some of them would find religion, give up their aggressive ways, and join a monastery, but who ever heard of a religious order whose mission was to go into battle?
It was an idea born of desperation. With the success of the first wave of crusaders, Jerusalem and the sites of the Bible were once again open to Christian pilgrims. And the pilgrims came in droves from all the corners of Christendom.
But, while the cities of Jerusalem, Tripoli, Antioch, and Acre had been taken, the roads that connected them were still, for the most part, in the hands of the Moslems. And there were a number of towns that had not been conquered. The pilgrims were fair game for raiding parties. At Easter in 1119 a party of some seven hundred was attacked while going from Jerusalem to the Jordan River. Three hundred of them were killed and another sixty captured and sold into slavery.6
Walter Map’s story of Hugh de Payns single-handedly guarding a watering hole may have come not from the Templars but from the experiences of a Russian, the abbot Daniel. In about 1107, he told of a place between Jaffa and Jerusalem where the pilgrims could get water. They would stay there for the night “in great fear” for it was near the Moslem town of Ascalon from “whence the Saracens would issue and massacre the pilgrims.”7
Despite the dangers, people were still determined to make the journey. The initial conquest of the Holy Land had been meant to reopen Jerusalem to pilgrims. Something had to be done to protect them. But King Baldwin and the other crusader lords didn’t have the men or the resources to patrol all the routes to the sites of the Bible that the pilgrims were determined to see. Whoever had the idea for the Templars, it was greeted with enthusiasm by local lords. In the end it was decided that Hugh and his friends could serve God best by keeping His pilgrims safe.
The Templars were at first a local group with no connection to the papacy. They received the approval of the patriarch of Jerusalem, Garmund, 1 and may have been presented at a church council held at the town of Nablus on January 23, 1120.
The council was not convened to establish the Knights of the Temple but to discuss problems that had developed in the twenty years since the founding of the Latin kingdoms. The main worry was that grasshoppers had been destroying the crops for the four years past. The general feeling was that this was a divine punishment because morals had slackened since the conquest of Jerusalem. So most of the twenty-five pronouncements that the council passed addressed the sins of the flesh.8
It is interesting that even though this was a religious council, there were as many lay lords as bishops participating. This shows that the concerns were widespread and needed to be solved by all those in power.
This council interests me because several historians of the Templars mention it as if it were important to the formation of the Templars, but, when I went to the official records, nothing was said about them.9Instead, the canons (laws) that were enacted at Nablus dwell on which sins the lords and clerics of Jerusalem thought were the worst. Seven of them forbid adultery or bigamy and four concern sodomy. Five more deal with sexual and other relations between Christians and Saracens, which were not allowed unless the Saracen had been baptized. The general implication seems to have been that if people stopped doing these things, the next harvest would be better.
There is no official report as to whether the decrees of the council were followed or if the next year’s crops were unmolested. From other sources, it appears that sins of the flesh were committed as usual.
The only canon that might relate to the Templars, a group still in its infancy, is number twenty: “If a cleric takes up arms in the cause of defense, he is not held to be guilty.”10 It does not mention knights becoming military clerics.
All the same, this was a radical departure. Despite the loosening of the command against general warfare in the case of those who fought for God, priests and monks had always been absolutely forbidden to fight.
However, at Antioch, the year before the council, Count Roger and most of his army had been killed outside the walls of the city in a battle still known as the “Field of Blood.” In order to save Antioch, the Frankish patriarch, Bernard, issued arms to anyone who could carry them, including monks and priests. Luckily, the clerics didn’t have to fight, but the precedent had been set.11
This was the atmosphere in which the Order of the Temple was formed.
ONE of the myths that the Templars told about their own beginning was that for the first nine years there were only nine knights. This is first mentioned in William of Tyre but was often repeated by later chroniclers who learned it from the Templars of their own time.12
Were there only nine members? Probably not. While the Order of the Temple didn’t seem to have grown very much in the first few years, it wouldn’t have lasted at all with so few men. The number nine might have been chosen because it went with the nine years from the founding until the Council of Troyes, where the order was given formal recognition.
Some scholars think the Templars may have been influenced by medieval number symbolism. Nine is a “circular number”: no matter how much it is multiplied, the digits always add up to nine or a multiple of it, “and therefore could be seen as incorruptible.”13 Many years after the founding, the poet Dante surmised that the number nine was chosen because “nine is the holy cipher of the order of angels, three times the holy cipher three of the Trinity.”14
I don’t think that the first knights were well enough educated to come up with something that esoteric. However, William of Tyre was, and it is in his chronicle that we first find this idea. It’s very possible that the number was William’s invention and that it was taken up by the Templars of his time and added to their own version of their legend. There’s no way to tell, but the number nine did become part of Templar lore and was used in the artwork in some Templar chapels.15 From there it came to be considered a fact simply because the legend had been repeated so often.
So we know very little about the first years of the Knights Templar. There are a few charters from Jerusalem and Antioch that are witnessed by the early members. But these are not gifts to the Templars, merely evidence that these men existed and were in the Holy Land. There are no surviving records of donations to the order before 1124.16
It is human nature to want to fill in the gaps, the blank spaces on the maps, the parts of the story that don’t seem enough. This is what happened to the story of the first Templars. At the time, they weren’t considered important enough for the chroniclers to mention. But sixty-odd years later, when they were an important part of society, people wanted to know how it all began.
And so the legends were born and started to grow. They are growing still.
1Charters of the Holy Sepulcher no. 105, in Thierry Leroy, Huges de Payns (Troyes, 2001) p. 194.
2 Michael the Syrian, in Malcom Barber and Keith Bate, The Templars: Selected Sources Translated and Annotated (Manchester University Press, 2002) p. 27. Taken from the Chronique de
Michel le Syrien, Patriarche Jacobite d’Antioch (1166-90), ed. and tr. J. B. Chabot (Paris: Ernest Lerous, 1905) p. 201.
3 Walter Map, De nugis curialium/Courtiers’ Trifles, tr. Frederick Tupper and Marbury Bladen Ogle (London, 1924) p. 33.
4 Text in Anthony Luttrell, “The Earliest Templars,” in Autour de la première croisade. Acts du Colloque de la Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East (Clerment-Ferrend, 22-25 juin 1995) ed. M. Balard (Paris: Publications do la Sorbonne, 1996) p. 196. “Quant li Chrestiien orent conquis Jherusalem, si se rendirent asses de chevaliers au temple del Sepucre; et mout s’en I rendirent pius de toutes tieres. Es estoient obeissant au prieux dou Sepucre. Il i ot de boins chevaliers rendus; si prisent consel entr’iaus et disent: “Nous avoumes guerpies noz tieres et nos amis, et sommes chi venu pour la loy Dieu i lever et essauchier. Si sommes chi arreste pour boire et pour mengier at por despendre, sans oevre faire; ne noient ne faisons d’armes, et besoinge en est en le tiere: . . . Prendons consel et faisons mestre d’un de nos, . . . ke nous conduie en bataille quant lius en sera.” (my translation)
5William of Tyre in Barber and Bate, pp. 25-26. Text in Guillaume de Tyr, Chronique, ed. R. B. C. Huygens, 2 vols. Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediavales 63 and 63A (Turnholt, 1986) 12.7 pp. 553-54 “Eodem anno quidam nobiles viri de equstri ordine, deo devotei religiosi et timentes deum, in monu domini patriarche Christi servicio se mancipantes, more canonicorum regularium in castitate et obedientia et sine proprio velle pertpetuo vivere professi sunt. Inter quos primi et precipui fuerenut viri vernerabiles Hugo de Pagainis et Gaufridus de Sancto Aldemaro. Quibus quoniam neque ecclesia erat neque certum habebant domicilium rex in palatio suo, quod secus Templum Domini as australem habet partem, eis ad tempus concessit habitaculum, . . . Prima autem eorum professio, quodque eis a domino patriarcha et reliquis episcopis in remissionem peccatorum iniunctum est, ut vias et itinera maxime ad salutem peregrinorum contra latronum et incursantium insidias pro viribus conservarent.”
6Malcolm Barber, The New Knighthood (Cambridge University Press, 1994) p. 9.
7Quoted in Edward Burman, The Templars, Knights of God (Rochester, VT: Destiny Books, 1986) p. 16.
8Charles-Joseph Hefele and H. Leclerq, Histoires de Conciles d’apres les documents Originaux, t. Va (Paris: Letouzey et Ané, 1912) p. 592.
9Benjamin Z. Kader, “On the Origins of the Earliest Laws of Frankish Jerusalem: The Canons of the Copuncil of Nablus, 1120,” Speculum April 1999 (Latin Canons reproduced from Bibiloteca Apostolica Vaticana, MS Vat. Lat. 1345 Fols. 1r-3r) pp. 331-34.
10 Ibid. p. 334. “Si clericus causa defenssionis [sic] arma detulerit, culpa non teneantur.” (my translation)
11 Ibid. p. 332 and in article. See also Steven Runciman, A History of the Crusades Vol. II (Cambridge University Press, 1952) pp. 150-52.
12William of Tyre, p. 554. “Cumque iam annis noven in eo fuissent proposito, non nisi novem errant.”
13 Barber and Bate, p. 3.
14Quoted in Marie Luise Buist-Thiele, “The Influence of St. Bernard of Clairvaux on the Formation of the Order of the Knights Templar,” ed. Michael Gervers The Second Crusade and the Cistercians (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992) p. 58.
15Ibid.
16 Marquis d’Albon, Cartularie Général de l’Ordre du Temple 1119?-1150 (Paris, 1913) p. 1. It was a donation made in Marseille and there are several uncertainties about it.
CHAPTER TWO
Hugh de Payns
Amid all the different theories about the beginning of the Templars there is one constant. The founder of the order was a certain Hugh de Payns, knight.
Some say he and a few comrades first approached the patriarch of Jerusalem, asking to live a monastic life in the city. Others report the men went to Baldwin II, king of Jerusalem. Still others suggest that it was Baldwin who asked Hugh and his friends to act as protectors to the many pilgrims coming from the West to Jerusalem.
In all of these, the main constant is Hugh.
But who was Hugh? Where is Payns? What was his background and who were his family? What could have led him to devote his life to fighting for God?
Despite his importance, even in his own day, a contemporary biography of Hugh has never been found. Nor has any medieval writer even mentioned reading one. I find this interesting because it indicates to me the uneasiness people felt about the idea of warrior monks. Other men who founded orders, like Francis of Assisi or Robert of Arbrissel, had biographies written about them immediately after their deaths. The main purpose of this was to have an eyewitness account of their saintliness in case they were suggested for canonization. Of the little that was written about Hugh, nothing was negative, but there
Hugh de Payns and Godfrey of St. Omer before King Baldwin II. (Bibliotheque
Nationale)
does not seem to have been any sense that he was in line for sainthood.
So how do we find out more about this man who started it all?
The first clue we have is from the chronicler William of Tyre. He says that Hugh came from the town of Payns, near Troyes in the county of Champagne.1 William also mentions Hugh’s companion, Godfrey of St. Omer, in Picardy, now Flanders. These two men seem, in William’s eyes, to be cofounders of the Templars, but it was Hugh who became the first Grand Master. This may have been through natural leadership, but it also may have been because Hugh had the right connections.
Payns is a small town in France, near Troyes, the seat of the counts of Champagne. It is situated in a fertile farmland that even then had a reputation for its wine. It’s not known when Hugh was born, or who his parents were. The first mention of him in the records is from about 1085-1090, when a “Hugo de Pedano, Montiniaci dominus,” or Hugh of Payns, lord of Montigny, witnessed a charter in which Hugh, count of Champagne, donated land to the abbey of Molesme.2 In order to be a witness, our Hugh had to have been at least sixteen. So he was probably born around 1070.
Over the next few years, four more charters of the count are witnessed by a “Hugo de Peanz” or “Hugo de Pedans.” Actually, the place name is spelled slightly differently each time it appears.3 It is also spelled “Hughes.” Spelling was much more of a creative art back then. However, it’s fairly certain that these are all the same man. These show that Hugh was part of the court of the count of Champagne, perhaps even related to him.
The last of these charters in Champagne is from 1113. The next time we find the name Hugh de Payns, it is in 1120 in Jerusalem. This is highly suggestive, as Hugh is witness to a charter confirming the property of the Order of St. John (the Hospitallers).4 So now we have confirmation of the story that Hugh was in Jerusalem in 1119-1120 to found the Templars outside of later histories. However, it is not until five years later that Hugh witnesses a charter in which he lists himself as “Master of the Knights Templar.”5 In between, he is witness to a donation made in 1123 by Garamond, patriarch of Jerusalem, to the abbey of Santa Maria de Josaphat. Here Hugh is listed only by the name “Hugonis de Peans.” There is no mention of the Templars and Hugh is near the end of the list of witnesses, showing that he was not one of the most important people present.6
How did Hugh get to Jerusalem? What happened in those five years between witnessing a charter as a layman and becoming Master of the Templars? We can guess, but unless more information appears, we can’t know for certain.
The most likely reason for Hugh to have gone to the Holy Land was in the company of Count Hugh. The count made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, his second, in 1114.7 There is no list of his companions, but it would fit that Hugh de Payns would have been in his company. Hugh was already among those at court often enough to be a witness to the count’s donations and therefore one of his liege men. But he must have been released from his obligation to his lord for, when Count Hugh returned home, Hugh de Payns remained in Jerusalem.
Why?
Again, Hugh hasn’t left anything to tell us. Was it as penance for his sins? Most pilgrimages were intended as a quest for divine
forgiveness. Many people have insisted that knights only went to the Holy Land for wealth, either in land or goods looted from those they conquered. But in Hugh’s case, once he decided to remain in Jerusalem he resolved to live the life of a monk, owning nothing.
It is even more surprising because Hugh apparently left a wife and at least one young child behind. His wife was named Elizabeth. She was probably from the family of the lords of Chappes, land quite close to Payns.8 Their son, Thibaud, became abbot of the monastery of La Colombe.9Hugh may have had two other children, Guibuin and Isabelle, but I don’t find the evidence for them completely convincing. 10
In principle, any married person wishing to join a religious order had to have the permission of his or her spouse and that spouse was also to join a convent or monastery. In practice, however, this didn’t happen that often, especially among the nobility. When Sybilla of Anjou, countess of Flanders, remained in Jerusalem to join the nuns at the convent of Bethany in 1151, her husband, Thierry, returned to Flanders and continued his life.11 Sometimes, the spouse remarried. It is not known what happened to Elizabeth. Perhaps she died before Hugh left Champagne.
Hugh did not abandon the place of his birth. When he returned to Europe to drum up support for the Knights of the Temple, he received his greatest support in Champagne. It was at the Council of Troyes, only a few miles south of Payns, that the order received official papal approval.
The Real History Behind the Templars Page 2
