The Fall of the Knights Templar

Historian James Martin and The fall of the great order of warrior monks, the Knights Templar. What really happened on Friday the 13th of October 1307? 

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Night Vision Vision. Following clues leftby our ancestors, we unbury the past
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(00:47):
Vision once again. Got a greatshow plan. I'm just going to get
right into it. At dawn onFriday October thirteenth, thirteen oh seven,
score of French templars were simultaneously arrestedby agents of King Philip, later to
be tortured in locations such as theTower Its Sheenan into admitting heresy and other

(01:14):
sacrilegious offenses in the order and thenthey were put to death. So that's
pretty much where we get the ideaabout Friday the thirteenth being an unlucky day.
However, there's a much much moreto that story, and I want

(01:34):
to find out exactly what did happenon that day, but also what do
we mean by scores of French templars, how many were really rounded up at
that time? And then what aboutall the rest of them, because we
know they were many at that time, not just knights themselves, but templar

(01:55):
families. So when I want toknow about out the templars, or really
just about about anything, who areyou gonna call? James Martin? Sounded
like Ghostbusters then, in which caseyou're the temple Busters. Yeah, you're
the temple Buster. Become an exercise. We kind of think. I have

(02:19):
one great to be back. It'sbeen a while. It's so good to
see you and you have you backon the air again with me. We've
missed you. So I know you'vebeen busy, busy, crazy, busy,
and so I'm glad you could takethe time to to come fill us
in today because we've talked about thisa lot, you and I about how

(02:40):
and of course you're right in themidst of writing a series of three books
about the entire history of the KnightsTemplar preconception to the bitter end, And
it certainly did not all And onFriday October thirteenth, thirteen oh seven,

(03:04):
So what did happen that day?And how many people are we talking about
that we're actually sort of rounded up, do you know, it's a really
difficult question to answer exactly how manypeople were rounded up, because the best
estimates of the night we're talking abouta third, so about the third of

(03:28):
the total population bought. The reasonit's complicated is because this is in France.
Remember the templars in you know,on the fourteenth of October thirteen oh
seven, in England and Scotland werecarrying on as normal. Same in Spain
and Portugal also, So we're talkingabout France. The problem is what is

(03:51):
France at this point? So ifyou look at the long Dock and you
look in the Rusium, which isis the well for the south in France,
you can get really other than inmainland France. Well, this part
is well, it's not part ofFrance at all. Then it's an independent

(04:13):
county really under the Crown of Aragon. And the preceptory there mass dayre very
much asserted that they under the protectionof the Crown of Aragon. That didn't
stop the French coming for them,though, so they I mean, didn't
that cause a problem? Oh?Ultimately yes it did, And ultimately we

(04:40):
see a crusade against Spain. Whenpeople forget when they're talking about the crusades
against the Cathars, there was anofficial campaign. Yeah, there was an
official crusade after that, and thenborder tensions. I mean, the the

(05:00):
order from escaped right the way intoessentially southern Spain, really deep into what
we would call Spain today. Ididn't stop the French Royal Army following them,
though, So you see, it'sreally difficult to establish exact numbers about
this this date. Yeah. Also, the other thing is certainly not the

(05:26):
majority, not at all. Imean I've been saving this from an interview
like this. I can give yousome names as to people who were tipped
off. So these are people whooff and then we were able to get
away. Yeah, yeah, soyou know again, and I think i'll
give a bit of a preamblem forthose people who are tuning in for the

(05:49):
first time, going why were theygot rid of? I'll do a bit
of a background in a little bit. But I just thought, just at
the very top, well, wellwe know that, if not all,
certainly some templars were tipped off.I am currently working on an interesting document

(06:11):
about the long Dock in southern France. But I can tell you something.
So you've got someone called Gen.De Shallon, let's call him John of
Shalon. I think he's a sergeantin the order. So he's a knight
templar. Remember, if you've heardme speak before, templars are not all

(06:32):
nights. Most of them actually arefarmers and you know pages, yeah,
yeah, you know, the retinuesand all of this. So Jon of
Shallon is arrested. He's one ofthe templars that is arrested and brought to
trial for ludicrous charges of everything fromhomosexuality, satanism, which craft, you

(07:00):
know, the all the usual stuff. Well, at his trial he says
something very interesting, and he saysthat his name is Gerard de Villiers or
Gerard of Villiers, had been tippedoff about the arrests and managed to escape

(07:20):
with eighteen galleys filled with some templetreasures. Now, okay, I'm gonna
say something really dumb. What's agalley? So a galley is a ship.

(07:41):
It's a cargo ship like a ship. Yep, don't think of the
ships that you you know, theseships of the line that you might think
of during the American Revolution, youknow, with lots of cannons. There
isn't there aren't any cannons. Sothese are ships that do some damage if

(08:01):
they rammed into you or if theyset off from the rumor is La Rochelle.
Oh oh, that's the old lawshell thing. So you know we
get to okay, So what wewhat we kind of have to do is
okay, So this person has confessedto this under torture. Can we get

(08:26):
any other sources? And you knowthe answer to that is yes. I
mean other people have written about this. You've got Malcolm Barber, he writes
in the Trial of the Templars.He gives reference. You've essentially got there's
a number of modern authors. Butcrucially we have the sort of extracts from

(08:54):
from torture really, you know,from from documents and again reading something in
France. Let's just try and verifywith a Geen Dechellon, you know,
was was right? And yeah,I can certainly certainly verify that our friend

(09:16):
Gerard de Villiers or Villa, hewas the last preceptor of France, and
I remember the night. Well,you have a grand master who is in
charge of all of the Templar provinces, So France England, you've got Turkey,

(09:41):
you know, you know, theLevant basically Middle East, what's left
of it, Italy, you know, and all of these they've got these
different provinces of not given you theaccurate names, by the way, but
if you want to find more,look them up. One of them was
France, that's what the grand master'sin charge of the entire order. But

(10:01):
each province had a perceptor. Nowwe don't call them commanderies, we call
them perceptories. So we're not onabout the preceptor of a local building,
you know, a templar center.What we are essentially talking about with it's

(10:30):
he is the Grand Preceptor of France, so he is running France. So
it becomes a little bit more interestingthen where we've got this idea that there's
a tip off. And of coursemany people got very excited about this and
started to say, oh, well, they sailed away from Lavachelle, they

(10:52):
did all of that, but someuncomfortable truths. The templars didn't have a
fleet at Lavachelle. They owned threeships speculatively the rest of them were mercenary
hired. So if they were tohave sailed off into the ocean, where
would these mercenaries go? They wouldcertainly want to be coming back unless there

(11:16):
was that much treasure that you know, convinced them, or the problem if
they did. Some have suggested thesometime presented up in America, that's possible.
You know, they could have followedthe old Norse routes by Iceland and
Greenland over. They certainly could havedone that. But treasure wouldn't have mattered,

(11:37):
would it. Who's going to purchaseanything in the Americans at the time
with gold, there's no money,there's no nothing, So either way it
gets it's all very that's all veryinteresting. We've done lots of shows on
that to answer. Really what we'relooking at is about a third of the

(12:01):
nights are arrested. Some of theworkers were arrested as well, there were
a handful, but it's generally believed. You know, you're talking about you
know, illiterate workers. You know, if they were, they certainly weren't
talked about. You know, theyweren't documented, So my senses now that

(12:26):
you know they went for the night. But again, the events of the
literally the break of dawn across France, instructions are open, you know,
quietly, boots are put on swords, you know, are armed plating.

(12:48):
You know, your armors put onsneak, sneak, sneak to the nearest
templar perceptory or whether the nearest nightis and knock, knock, knock,
we have a warrant for your arrest. Apart from it seems a lot of
circumstances. No one was home.So there is another idea as well that

(13:15):
floats around that the the grand Masterof the order and a number of others
basically the Paris Perceptory, the ParisTemple as you know, as we know
it, the grand master is someonecalled Jacques de Muley. And again you've

(13:41):
got a lot of rumor here thatessentially he knew of the King of France's
orders. And again we'll go backand you know, meet ourselves about what
those orders were. But it isalleged that the wife of King Philip the

(14:05):
fourth fronts tipped off Jacques Malay.It was decided that he would sacrifice himself
to allow others to escape. Anddidn't he or isn't it alleged that he
he cursed the king? And whoelse was that there were? That he

(14:33):
there was a king of the pope. Yeah, each of them were dead
within the year. Yeah, andthat certainly is it's a little bit too
roman What is that thing about sevenhundred years. I used to hear this,
this story, this legend, thisrumor that there was you know,

(14:56):
the knights Templar would avenge themselves orsomething would happen, you know, in
seven hundred years. Of course,the thing is, what you've actually got
is there's a lot of poetry ifyou think about it, you know,

(15:20):
as this person is burning and youthink about you know, if you put
your hand on the hob and you'reimmediately going you're probably not going to come
out with a curse well, youprobably will come out with a curse word.
It's not going to deliver a fullSo these stories tend to come about

(15:43):
afterwards. Do you know what though, you know these are very some times
stoic, you know, worry amonks. It is possible, we do
know when people have self emulated,you know, there's so themselves on fire
that they have spoke. But yeah, again there's a lot of romanticism.

(16:04):
And you know the other story is, of course, when during the execution
during the French Revolution of the Frenchking Leuis the sixteenth sixteenth, when he's
beheaded. Someone screams from the crowd, Jacques de mole thou Art avenged.

(16:26):
It sounds excellent, doesn't it.Yeah, good to be true. But
listen, as an historian, wewant them to be true because you know,
we have the benefit of reading right, so we want the conclusion.
We want eventually this this horrible storyto finally be avenged, and of course

(16:52):
we also want it to be true. The reality is is maybe there's a
lot of romance around this whole thing, you know for sure, and that's
probably you know we talked about theseven hundred years. Well, actually more
people today I think than ever atleast know of the Templars in this way
their memory ex Maybe it's you know, the redemption of the Templars. You

(17:17):
know, they're redeemed, you know, which brings me to I mean,
I'm skipping way way ahead, butI know also that you've recently been to
some locations that I want to getto as well. Well, we have
the chance. Well we've got youhere as a captive. But I remember

(17:41):
very well back in two thousand andone when a woman named Barbara Frawley came
out with a document which became knownas the Sheenon. Is it she Noon
or is it Sheon? Yes,non documents and that was actually written and

(18:04):
signed. Ah, you know backin the thirteen hundreds that absolved the Knight's
templar and restored them fully to theirfull rights. Oh that was crazy,
to their full rights. Hello thetemplars. But which was which was great?

(18:33):
And then I remember I think itwas around two thousand and seven or
maybe even a little after that thatthe I remember it was over in Monsigor,
wasn't it where the bishop came fromthe church and sort of issued the

(18:55):
decree or the apology to the ninthTempler. Yeah, there was an apology
for the Cathars I think I wastwenty twelve thirteen, and then yes,
you know, another apology for thetemplars. Yeah, the sheen On documents
on parchments, you know, gobuy things. Essentially, you know that

(19:19):
you've got this. The instruction wasfor the nights actually not to be arrested
and taken under the king's watch,but instead over to the Pope in Poitier,
where the Pope was going to personallyintervene. Now the reality of that
situation is if that would have happened, you know, in a different timeline.

(19:45):
If those nights had gone to thepope, almost certainly the Pope would
have escaped captivity from Avenue and thetemplars would likely still be around wo private
army ultimately. I mean, what'sso crazy, you know, is that

(20:07):
that document, you know, wasso old and you know, was just
you know, discovered in the archivesin two thousand and one. But even
worse than that is there was anothersheen On document which basically said almost the

(20:30):
same thing and was even signed bysome of the same people that had been
issued and was actually made public andis fairly well known among scholars and academics,
but yet not widely has never beenwidely released out there to the public.

(20:55):
So, I mean, it wasdefinitely made known in the sixteen US
that there had been that that otherdocument. Yeah, and that of the
document was issued by oh it wasStephen Balu's a or Balus so in French

(21:18):
Stephen is Etien so if you wantto read a little bit further, and
it was it was in sixteen ofsixteen ninety three, sixteen. He was
around about that period, and hewas you know, an historian. And
yes, again this other Genon document, this one was the you know,

(21:44):
I me're saying another Sheenon document.You know this is a separate you know,
as you say, a sort ofsecond one of variation. Well I
think it was actually you know theywere each issued in shen Yes, that's
right. Well, the second oneis addressed to Philip the fourth and essentially

(22:10):
says, you know, all knightswho have confessed to heresy have had the
sacraments restored to them, restored tothe sacraments. Yeah, brought back into
the church in essence. So you'vegot you know, again, whether they
want to be or not. Yeah, you know, we've we've we've captured

(22:33):
them in person, and now we'regoing to capture them. Yeah, theocratically.
Yeah, the notion really is.I mean, you know, the
pope's been caught. He's been caughtby jo Gray, who's the Chancellor of
France, the one of the effectiveprime minister of France, one of the

(22:56):
most important people at the time,and he goes and kidnapped his village,
right his place, yes, Felix, Yeah, yeah, and yeah,
a town of Cathars. I mean, you've got across the Cathar Monument.
Very moving guy thought, but yeah, he's from there, and you know,

(23:18):
you think, what a horrible manfrom such a beautiful village. He
was very pleasant and I do recommendto anyone who has the opportunity to visit
the Long Dock and is, youknow, around to Lose and Carcasson,
to take the the trip out there. I mean, there's a monument to

(23:40):
the Cathars, but of course inthe Long Dock and the Ossitania more generally,
you can't talk about the templars withoutcoming across the Cathars too. But
yeah, he's talking about that placethat's up on the hill. Yeah,
yeah, with the different dedications.Yes, yeah, nice place to be

(24:04):
and fittingly on a village totally destroyed. There's very little to see a bit
apart from the walls on the youknow, you have to let your eyes
just and then oh, good god. This is an entire village that was
burnt down because people thought differently.Well, and that that they that the

(24:27):
Church never made it known that theyhad been granted absolution. You know,
they've obviously sat on this information andI don't know, I just did a
show recently with Walter Bosley on wherewe talked about the Vatican archives, and

(24:52):
you know what may or may notbe in there, and uh, it
just seems like it's such a waste. I mean, it seems like the
things that are held in the Vaticanarchives, you know, at the very
least, belonged to the world.Not to mention the items that in artifacts,

(25:15):
in writings, manuscripts, parchments thatactually belonged to particular families or cultures.
Well, how is that? Becausethe Church is very touchy organization,
that's probably not the answer he waslooking for. But the Church are very

(25:37):
sensitive and you know, if Iwas the Church and I can't answer for
the Vatican, I totally agree withyour comments. But when you think about
it, two popes were kidnapped byGian Degre and tuk to Avenuon, and
what that meant for the Catholic Westof Europe was you had a French pope,

(26:00):
you had puppet popes, and youhad then an anti pope who was
supported by countries that perhaps didn't likeFrance, England, for example, Portugal
might agree that, you know,the true pope is actually not this this
French person. Now, of course, popes don't like to be reminded that,

(26:25):
you know, there are anything butinfallible. So this idea that they
could be caught and twice and kidnappedand put within you know, the You
can go and visit avegne On todayand see the palaces and whatever else.
But you know, they don't liketo be reminded of that. And might
it be that they made a mistake, you know that they actually shouldn't have

(26:53):
signed off on the orders to disbandthe templars, perhaps should have four a
little bit further. I mean,yes, okay, Philip's got the Pope.
What about all these cardinals and whatabout the rest? Why didn't this
become the crusade against the French?You know, essentially you've got you know,

(27:15):
Philip the fourth. You know,look, the real reason Philip the
Fourth wanted rid of the Temple Orderwas Pope's private army. One. Two,
he had an ego Three he hadno gray whispering in his ear,
Like if you've watched the film wasit a Lord of the Rings? One

(27:36):
of them and you've got someone whisperingin the kings, you know that sort
of idea. You know, Idon't know where we're up to four or
five. The King's heavily indebted tothe Order. You know that they are
running right. That's why he didit. He owed him a lot of
money. Yeah, and crucially theparanoia had reached fever pitch because there was

(28:02):
and there's another order that perhaps doesn'tget the light of day as much as
it should, and these this isan order called the Teutonic Knight, and
the Teutonic Knight effectively Prussia Brandenburg morearound Germany, northern Germany, southern body.

(28:23):
Yeah, you know, around thisarea. And that's it. You
know, the Teutonic Knight essentially ruledgeographical Prussia as it's known, had charters
that were issued by the Pope andcrucially the Holy Won Emperor, and they

(28:44):
were established as a sovereign monastic state. Now they were independent, and Philip
is concerned that, you know,something like twenty five percent of temple landholdings
rather than the long Dock that essentiallyTemplars were going to announce their independence in
a very similar way, and that'swhat they wanted. Now, something else

(29:11):
that's often missed. You know,you've got that bit of paranoia. You
know, I'm bear in mind fromthe French King's perspective, there's just been
a crusade against the Cathars. Essentiallythat was not really against the Cathars.
It was done under heresy, butessentially it was a land grab from the
Northern French. I'd only been rulingthe territory for a short period of time.

(29:38):
And the thing that people forget isthe und of money and power,
doesn't it? It always does.But I'm sorry, we can't let the
Templars off on this because in thirteenoh six the Templars supported a coupe in
Cyprus which essentially there was regime changethe same and gives way in favor of

(30:03):
his brother. And you know,essentially this is the power of the order.
You know, the order can choose. They're becoming the kinkmakers. So
from Phillip's perspective, we better sortsomething out otherwise I'm not going to be
able to effectively resist. So whathe does is, you know, and

(30:26):
famously, by the way, andlook again, Friday the thirteenth, we've
spoke about this, you know,can I just recommend you haven't got a
subscription to KJRA get onto it andyou can have a look at the back
catalog. And we did a showcalled Friday the thirteenth and the Origin,
So we know, just as areminder that Friday the thirteenth probably has some

(30:48):
very deep rooted historical connections going backto Babylon. This day, each Friday
the thirteenth, each October thirteenth,there's a plus session in honor of the
Knight's Templar that of a group ofpeople. I don't know who they are,
but they are dressed in white robesand carrying torches and you can watch

(31:11):
them going up the mountain side ofthe Mount Bazoo. It's really interesting.
Anyone will be going us I'm notsure. I'm not sure, but you
know, there have been stories toldby certain you know, authors and others

(31:33):
that there was some sort of templarpresence there at one time or another and
they stopped. I remember that there'ssomething about gold up there. They were
digging for gold or something. AndI don't know, but I will tell
you one thing about Bezoo is onetime my friend, you know, late

(31:57):
friend, our late friend, GloryAmadola, and I were taking a tour
group over and we went over toBazu and there's like a meadow at the
foot of Beazu. As we wereapproaching, we could see this beautiful rainbow.

(32:22):
And when we got up there therainbow actually ended right there in the
valley. It went right into theground. I've never seen the end of
the rainbow. So LGB templars.Yeah, okay, enough, Yeah,
I've my doubt some buzzy If I'mhonest, I mean there was something there.

(32:43):
But by the way, yeah,basically just for everyone. Is a
very small hamlet village if you wantto, Yeah, not you far away
from the town of the village ofrel the chateau. It's been alleged that

(33:07):
there is a templar building there andthe best I can find is that they,
you know, had stopped there,not that they owned it, or
if they did own it the daythat I had some recollection of someone's saying
that Bernard or Claervo had been overthere. Again, you know, look,

(33:32):
just because historian says no, doesn'tmean it didn't happen. I just
can't find any evidence of it,can't collaborate it. Yeah, but it
just coming back to, you know, the templars and their downfall. So
we've just discussed Cypress. The reallyreality is as well the Templars. You

(33:57):
know, in previous shows, you'veseen the temp map and that's just the
buildings. The amount of land thatthey are significant. They're not paying any
tax, you know, the credityou just mentioned. The map. I've
just got to say that map isincredible. What what James has done is

(34:20):
mostly on the ground research, butalso pouring through archives and all kinds of
restricted academic archives that I don't haveaccess to and most of us don't,
and verifying these locations. And he'screated a map and a and Europe is

(34:43):
almost completely read. Each each sideis marked by a red templar cross and
you can click on it and it'llbring up a little photo, a little
explanation of the site, whether ornot it's verified and all that. And
it's just an amazing, amazing thing. We've got to figure out how to

(35:07):
get that up on our website.And then also, you know, I've
got designs on creating a little center, a tourist center there in the region,
and I would love to have iton the wall there. That would
be amazing, it would I haveto say, it'd be good to see
that happen again. If you lookat you know, some of the other

(35:31):
episodes we've done have shown them up. I mean, this is one of
the reasons why we are still talkingabout the downfall of the Templars. The
events were so shocking and if youhave a look back, I haven't got
it loaded unfortunately to show everyone.But again you can have a look back
at you know, the archives andby the way, the secret archives.

(35:52):
I've got access to the academic ones, not the Vaticans. So yeah,
it's an interesting case you want todrink, but yeah, it's this event
was so shocking because as you seeon the map, there are so many
template sites everywhere. They were.You know, they were around the corner,

(36:12):
you know, they not just aroundthe corner. They were in your
village. You know, you probablyhad a relative who worked for them.
They were as every day is yourbank card? You know, and well
better exactly a nice analogy because theywere kind of the first bankers. Yes,

(36:34):
that's not met as an insult.You know. Imagine you you know,
you've lost your bank cards, yougo into a bit of panic,
and this is exactly what happened whenthey were disbanded. Nobody thought this could
have happened, you know. That'sthat's interesting. I wanted to ask you
if we mentioned earlier about how youknow, the Templars have you know,

(36:59):
sort of been romantic size, andthey're they're very they're very popular among most
people are people that know about them. But what about you know, at
the time, obviously they were veryprevalent. They were everywhere. They were
right next door, around the cornerand everything else. But generally just the

(37:22):
populace, what do you think wastheir impression of the Templars? Did they
like them, did they respect them? I'm sure they didn't romanticize them,
you know. No, what weunderstand about the Templars and the attitude of
people's attitudes to them, it isquite a mixed bank, to be honest,

(37:45):
William of Tier we know hates them, I mean absolutely despises them.
And the best we can get is, you know, some people thought they
were petty because they would constantly beprovoking the hospitaler another order, you know,

(38:06):
emptying water tanks, dressing up asthem, you know, changing their
their robes so they look like ahospitaler, and then causing mischief in a
village. You know, very petty, but that's you know, isolated incident.
I think some would have seen themas an employer. That's smacks of
like fraternity pranks or something like.Yeah, well that's basically what it is

(38:32):
you know, you've got to remember. Look, if you were to get
if you wanted to go for atrip around time, you get into a
time machine, can I recommend avoidingreally the thirteen hundreds because you know you've
got this huge shock. You know, like I said, your bank cards
have been white. There's nothing there. You know, what are we going

(38:53):
to do? You know, thedownfall of the templars in France, and
it did spread in a limited fashionto England, you know, not necessarily
Afy, wehere else. But whenthey were despatched, I mean, this
is shocking stuff. This is youknow, suddenly the building you know that's
next door to your house just thatnext day isn't there. Now I'm speaking

(39:17):
metaphorically. They weren't demolishing these buildings, but you know, the order it
didn't exist. So it's shocking.Whatever you thought, some would have been
happy, some would have been exceptionallyconcerned about, well, what's going to
happen next? I would imagine theywere, you know, terribly inconvenienced in

(39:38):
a lot of ways. Yeah,you know, you've got don't think about
it. The Crusades have effectively beenlost. You've got the Siege of Acre
tire. You know, you've gotall these losses, and eventually the Crusader
states finished taken by the Islamic forces. You know, there's this retreat and

(40:06):
then suddenly you're getting rid of thearmy that's been helping to fight against this
so called Infidel and it's no longerthere who's going to protect you over the
border if you're in southern France oryou're in Spain. It's still a large
chunk of Spain which is called alAnderlous. You know, who's going to
help then, So there's a lotof uncertainty, not to mention time traveling

(40:30):
friends, you've got that shock toyour system coming, and then once you've
got over that, plagues on itsway. So try and avoid this period,
I would suggest, you know,it's you know, it's full of
turbulence and really marked the downfall ofthe French monarchy as well. So where

(40:52):
you've got Philip and where you've gotPhilip, you know, King Philip the
fourth of Friends, you know,and he I think there's also a slightly
different tact with this, you know, having just finished a chapter, I
very nearly finished the book now actually, but on the Merror of Engines,

(41:17):
Carol Engines, and you know,eventually the kapetionis he took over the Carol
Engines. The kpetions, you know, Philip the Fourth is a kapetion.
And I think they believe they hada god given right to be a king,
but not just that. They hadan ancient write and I think there

(41:38):
was an arrogance that said, hereis this pope, now we are much
more divine than he, and Ireally do think that had another or at
least it was an excuse that couldbe used and all of this. So
essentially, you know, for thosepeople who somehow are not familiar, just

(42:00):
the usual repeat. So what happenedwas probably within two weeks, you know,
perhaps around October the first, youknow, and again just please bear
in mind when we're looking at calendars, they were using the Julian calendar.

(42:21):
We use the Gregorian calendar. Therehad been you know, you've got Pope
Gregory to come yet and he sortsthe calendar out or maybe had it done.
But anyway, just let's bear inmind Britain, for example, remained
on the Julian calendar until the seventeenhundred. So we're not getting into the
dates. Let's just go with whatwe know. Brand about the first October

(42:44):
orders are issued, distributed around allof the French King's territories. I suggest
it would have been staggered. You'recertainly not going to send those orders out
on Thursday the sixth, sorry forThursday in the twelfth seven. They're not
going to arrive in time, andit'd look a bit odd if suddenly,

(43:06):
you know, King's court, yearsof racing around the country, that would
have attracted some attention. So veryquietly, and the orders were not to
be opened, you know, onpain of death, effectively, do not
open this envelope, this parchment,this seal until the morning of Friday the

(43:30):
thirteenth. So again some people haveasked about time. Well, you know,
well here we are sorry to datethis recording, but today is the
longest day. It certainly feels likeit, but it's the solstice. Is
the longest day of my life.Yeah, it's just been talking to me.

(43:52):
So, yeah, you know,these these orders, you know,
open up. We don't know exactlythe time it's break. So we're in
October. It's going to be aroundabout eight nine o'clock in the morning,
something like this, And there theyare. But the French king was kind
of hoping not just to arrest allof the night, but also to take

(44:19):
treasures presumably and anything else that couldget hold of. And they they found
nothing. Yeah, there were somevery few things were captured, but nothing
like in This is then led tothe larger mysteries as to what happened trousers.
Yeah, so what happened to it? Maybe they never had it,

(44:42):
maybe they gambled, I don't know, you know, whatever the story,
but we don't know. In essence, they had you know, they were
the first bankers. You know,they established a you know, monastic banking
system, I guess. But youknow, travelers checks essentially around Europe.

(45:06):
And they were tortured. You know, they were tortured, you know,
she no on. It is importantbecause you know they were tortured in the
tower sheen on the name of theLord. Yeah. And you know,
if you're tortured, you know,I'm not anything. Oh my god.

(45:29):
Yeah. And by the way,let's not look back to our medieval friends
and think, oh well, youknow, look, you know how simple
and barbaric they knew that they knewpeople. The Romans knew if you torture
people, you can't rely on theconfession, right, This was, you
know, extract something from them.And perhaps it was a little bit more

(45:52):
than just confess to these charges.I mean information, getting information out of
someone, Historians out there, peoplewith an interest in history, people like
the past, all of that.I'll tell you. If you read from
so called dark Ages, earn amedieval period right the way through. The

(46:13):
Church has a general script for peoplethey don't like, and it goes like
this, You're either a woman,are you gay? Auto medical, you're
let's see you think differently. Youmust clearly be you know, a sodomite.
You must be a witch. It'sthe same nonsense over and over,

(46:38):
and you must confess to it.Oh yes, yes, yes, and
then crucially, let's just tweak thetorture package for you. And so what
they did was included the worshiping ofa head Baha met you know, goes
by different names, you know,not particularly clear what meant by that.

(47:00):
It could be Muhammed, it couldbe something else, uh whatever, I
think the samplers that are what thatwhat kind of cipher is it? At?
Bash? Yeah? Bash cipher.It translates to sofia, which is,

(47:21):
you know, wisdom, Holy Wisdom, yeah, which is feminine,
so it could be. But I'lljust say this as well, you know,
and I am open for that ideadefinitely. But I just make the
reminder how many heads of John theBaptist are there in Europe? I mean

(47:43):
about as probably probably not as manyas splinters of the of the True Cross.
No, that's a very big pieceof woodbye now. But you know,
John the Baptist needs a paperly sanctified, by the way, So the
best I can come to is Johnthe Baptist was a hydra, you know,

(48:05):
So being realistic though, you know, these were the trump charges,
and I suspect were not about theconfession, more about where's f one gone?
Where's the money? You know?And there you go. In total,
of the one hundred, there wasone hundred and thirty eight templars,

(48:30):
most of them exceptionally elderly by thesestandards of the time. You know,
you're talking fifty to fifty five,very elderly. They were the ones who
were questioned in Paris. Remember whatI've just said. It's difficult to get
lots of numbers together making it tomake something very accurate. But of the

(48:50):
one hundred and thirty eight who werecaptured and tortured in Paris. We don't
need to repeat what kind of torturethat went on. One hundred and five
confessed, Uh, you know,so these were confessions to an obscene kiss.
You know, god, what elsethat they mean? Meaningless confession defy,

(49:16):
the stand on the cross and anythingto stop the pain. These are
elderly men. You know, let'sjust remind ourselves with this. We can
talk about the political intrigue of aking, but at the end of the
day, we're talking about some ofthose barbaric things that can go on in

(49:37):
and still very much going on rightnow. Well, oddly enough, at
a very similar part of the worldthat the templars would have known torture it
should be outlawed. You know,they think of you. You know,
if you have a doesn't make peoplearen't going to do it. Though I

(50:00):
suspect there's more torture going on todayin certain countries then well, you know,
in fact, in most countries,I think there's more torch going on
than there ever was in the medievalperiod. But just think, you know,
if you can't, because they areyou know, we are talking seven

(50:21):
hundred years ago plus you can't feelanything for people with that distance in time.
Then think to your grandparents, yourfather, maybe your brother, you
know someone that you do love,and imagine them being tortured, because that's
what we're referring to. Yeah,and all of it outwardly for money,

(50:46):
when actually the templars seemed not everywhere, but in some places seemed to be
the preservers of very ancient wisdom.Mm hmm. So getting down to the
wire here, we just got afew minutes left, So why don't you

(51:07):
fill us in on your accidental researchthat you did research? Oh good,
Yeah, that was so crazy.Yeah, long story cut short, But
anyway, it was reminded that oncertain social media platforms you get reminders of

(51:32):
dates in history, and I hadto remind him it was. It was
a photo from an event and afew photos actually, including one of a
hotel room that was stopping him ina place called Grantham. And a friend

(51:55):
who was with asked, oh,you was the name of that place that
we that we stopped in, andso I think it was it was the
Angel or something like that. Soanyway, looked it up and yeah,
oh yes, it was the Angeland the Royal and all of this,
but of course because it would beas we was reminiscing over the event,

(52:22):
you know, a sort of partycatch up, you know, that kind
of idea jumped out of my skinbecause uh, it turned out that the
hotel was actually we had not chosen. Oh no, I didn't know this
was book through work. Well someoneto work with us should say no no,

(52:46):
So yeah, it turned out thiswas a temple building and by the
way, one of the oldest stillgoing businesses in the UK found to part
of the Templars. A message hadcome through not enough time to go through
just a few days prior to this, effectively an alleged message from the other

(53:10):
side from somebody he had basically said, you know my name the Templars,
and then then reply with you knowthey're looking for him. Well, they
absolutely found me with this boundary.It was very bizarre. What's interesting too

(53:32):
was that they said that you knowthere was something in England, you know,
yeah, And it just was funnybecause you were in England and an
accidental hotel as it turns out tobe built by the Knights Templar and actually

(53:54):
not that far away from a towncalled boulduck Is where the temple Brewer preceptory
is what does mean means bag daddad. Yeah, yeah, And basically the
temple is named this place Baghdad basedupon the French bolldock French word even now

(54:22):
for bagh dad. So just oneof those sort of okay, you know,
very unusual sort of set of circumstances. And yes, I've got some
further trips to France as well,perhaps for another show, will have completed

(54:45):
some of the journeys there. I'dsay since I was last one, I
did visit a commandery in France calledthe sal Commandery, currently being restored.
Hmmm, where is that? It'sjust well it's in New Aquitan, so

(55:13):
near the town of Leborn, kindof near Bordeaux. Well, yes,
you know, since last been onthe show, that is very interesting.
Yeah, nothing compared to the perceptoriesof the long Dock where it symbology,

(55:35):
mystery, et cetera. But stillanother one to tick off the map is
having visited. Yeah, literally takeit off the map. My goodness.
Well, I really appreciate you takingthe time to come back and join us
again, and I hope you don'tstay away long. And onwards upwards,

(56:00):
up the dogs are starting to gocrazy, right on time, right on
time, right on as we say, no, I will carve out sometime.
Hopefully we come on with the nextI don't know, a few weeks,
months, whatever. It should bea little quieter following some medical interventions

(56:23):
and all the rest of it.So yes, you good to see if
you want, and take care ofyourself. Thanks for having me, Thanks,
good night, everybody.