Europe's inner demons

To Philip the religious megalomaniac the existence of the Temple presented an infuriating obstacle, while to Philip the politician the destruction of the Temple offered financial relief. For the great officers of the Temple were rigidly opposed to any amalgamation with the Hospital. The two orders had always competed — for endowments, for recruits, for renown. In the Holy Land they had of necessity collaborated in fighting the Saracens — yet even then the rivalry between them had often led to bloody clashes. With the loss of the Holy Land, the only bonds between them snapped. When Pope Clement V asked the last grand master of the Temple, Jacques de Molay, for his views on amalgamation, the response was decidedly negative.⁽⁵⁾ Clement passed Molay’s memorandum to the royal officials; so Philip knew that so long as the Temple survived as an autonomous institution, it would block even the first steps to his becoming

Bellator Rex. This happened in 1306, the same year in which Philip despoiled and expelled the Jews. And Philip knew that the Temple in France was vastly richer than the Jews.

Up to that time, relations between the king and the French Templars had been excellent. As we have seen, the Paris Temple acted as unofficial ministry of finance, its treasurer was warden of the royal revenues. During 1303-4 Philip’s financial needs resulted in particularly close dealings with the order; and as a reward for services rendered he published a most flattering proclamation in which he praised the Templars for their piety, their charity, their liberality, their valour — and substantially increased their already extensive privileges in his kingdom. Jacques de Molay stood godfather to Philip’s infant son.

On 12 October 1307 the grand master received a further honour; for on that day he acted as pall-bearer at the funeral of the wife of the king’s brother, Charles of Valois. Early in the morning of 13 October the Templars throughout France were arrested by officers of the crown. The torturers began their work, and within a few days confessions began to accumulate. Most of the offences to which the Templars confessed mirror the age-old fantasies with which this book is concerned. The work of Conrad of Marburg was being resumed, under the auspices of the king of France.

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Early in 1304 or (more probably) 1305 a Frenchman called Esquiu de Floyran made his way to Lerida, where King James II of Aragon was accustomed to pass the spring months.⁽⁶⁾

He obtained an audience of the king and, in the presence of the king’s confessor, made certain horrific revelations concerning the Order of the Knights Templars. But the situation of the Temple in Aragon was very different from its situation in France: it had no autonomy but was wholly dependent on, and devoted to, the monarch. James II had little incentive to turn against his faithful Templars, and refused to take the revelations seriously without real proof.

Esquiu returned to France. Did he already then make contact with the chief of the new-style civil servants, Guillaume de Nogaret, who was to play such a large part in the destruction of the Temple? Did Nogaret plan everything that followed? It has never been proved, but it does seem likely. Somehow Esquiu got access to King Philip. According to one not improbable story, he had himself imprisoned along with a criminal who had once been a Templar. Both were under sentence of death, and they confessed their crimes to one another. The ex-Templar confessed to having performed such extraordinary iniquities, during his years in the order, that Esquiu felt it his absolute duty to pass the information on to the king, and bullied the prison officers until he got his way. However that may be, Esquiu de Floyran certainly provided the “information” which enabled Philip to proceed against the order. He reappears later in the story too. He took an active part in torturing Templars under interrogation, and by 1313 was comfortably in possession of a piece of land which had belonged to the Temple. He also wrote to King James of Aragon, claiming a share in the property of the Aragonese Templars.