CHAPTER II
THE KNIGHTS TEMPLARS AND THEIR SUCCESSORS
About the year 1118 certain noblemen, horsemen, religiously bent, bound themselves by vow in the hands of the Patriarch of Jerusalem, ‘to serve Christ after the manner of Regular Canons in chastity and obedience, and to renounce their owne proper willes for ever.’
The Order was founded by a Burgundian Knight who had mightily distinguished himself at the capture of Jerusalem. Hugh de Paganis was his name. Only seven of his comrades joined the Brotherhood at first.
Their first profession was to safeguard pilgrims on their way to visit the Holy Sepulchre, and to keep the highways safe from thieves. A rule and a white habit were granted to this pilgrims’ police by Pope Honorius II. Crosses of red cloth were afterwards added to their white upper garments, and earned them the familiar title of the Red-Cross Knights. And for their first banner they adopted the Beaucéant, the upper part of which was black, signifying, it is said, death to their enemies; the lower part white, symbolizing love for their friends.
Their services were rewarded and their efforts encouraged by Baldwin, King of Jerusalem, who granted them quarters in his palace, within the sacred enclosure of the Temple on Mount Moriah.
Hence they came to be known as the Knights of the Temple, or Knights Templars. For Baldwin’s Palace was formed partly of a building erected by the Emperor Justinian, partly of a mosque built by the Caliph Omar, upon the site of Solomon’s Temple.
The Order increased rapidly in popularity. It spread over Europe and the East, accumulating property and privileges. It was most highly organized, and at its head was a Grand Master, who resided at first in Jerusalem. A visit paid by the Founder, Paganis, to Henry I. in Normandy led to the establishment of settlements in England. Cambridge, Canterbury, Warwick, and Dover are mentioned amongst others by Stow. Temples, ‘built after the form of the Temple near to the Sepulchre at Jerusalem,’ were erected in many of the chief towns in England. And this circular shape of church, modelled upon the Holy Sepulchre in accordance with a prevailing love of imitating the holy places at Jerusalem, as, for instance, the Stations of the Cross, was the design adopted for the Templars’ London Churches. The date of their first settlement in London is not certain, but about the middle of the twelfth century they are said to have established themselves in Chancery Lane, between Southampton Buildings and Holborn Bars. Their property, which was afterwards to be known as the Old Temple, embraced part of the site of what is now Lincoln’s Inn. The foundations of a round church were discovered in 1595 near the site of the present Southampton Buildings.
But it was not long before they moved to a pleasanter site, to the ‘most elegant spot in the Metropolis,’ as Charles Lamb declared. For, about the year 1180, the Templars acquired a large meadow sloping down to the broad River Thames, on the south side of Fleet Street, and stretching from Whitefriars on the east to Essex Street on the west. Here they built themselves a lordly dwelling-place and a splendid Church, again a round Church upon the same sacred model, part of which still stands. Across the way lay their recreation ground. For the site of the modern Law Courts--that Gothic pile which we can never wholly see, and in which Street just failed to design a truly complete, effective, and absolute building, and failed entirely to produce a building practically suited for its purpose--was known then as Fitchett’s Field. The scene of the labours of the Lawyers, who have succeeded to their inheritance, was once the tilting-ground of the Knights Templars.
Five years later, in 1185, in the presence of Henry II. and all his Court, the dedication of the Round Church of the ‘New Temple’ took place. The ceremony was performed by Heraclius, Patriarch of Jerusalem.
The surroundings of the ‘New Temple,’ when Henry graced it upon this occasion with his royal presence, were extraordinarily different even from the aspect they wore a century later.
Fleet Street itself was not yet in existence. Its neighbourhood was a mere marsh, and Fleet Ditch, at the bottom of Ludgate Hill, was spanned by no bridge. The two highways to the City, when the Templars first settled at this spot, were first and foremost the River, and, secondly, by land, the old Roman Way through Newgate, up Holborn Hill to Holborn Bars, striking southwards from St. Mary-le-Strand, past the Roman Bath, to the River. But seventy years later a new main route to the City was constructed, which passed by the boundary of the Templars’ plot. For the marshes were drained, a bridge was thrown across the Fleet, and the ‘Street of Fleetbrigge’ came into existence.
The grandeur of the ceremony of dedication and the splendour of the Templars’ Church itself indicate clearly enough the importance of the ‘New Temple’ as the headquarters of the Order in England, and also the waxing wealth and power of the Order itself.
For these ‘fellow-soldiers of Christ,’ as they termed themselves, ‘poor and of the Temple of Solomon,’ had bound themselves to a vow of poverty, but they soon changed their allegiance to Mammon. The heraldic sign of the Winged Horse, which is now the well-known badge of the Inner Temple, and meets the eye at every turn as we pass through the narrow lanes and devious courts of which their property is composed, recalls and typifies the changing purposes of the ancient Templars and their successors. For the old crest of the Templars was a horse carrying two men, which probably was intended to suggest their profession of helping Christian pilgrims upon their road, but in which some saw an emblem of humiliation and of a vow to poverty so strict that they could afford but one horse for two knights. Whatever its significance, the badge was changed with changing circumstances. The two riders were converted into two wings, and the horse transformed into a Pegasus--Pegasus argent on a field azure--upon the occasion of some Christmas Revels and pageantry held at the Inner Temple in honour of Lord Robert Dudley, 1563, when it appears that this emblem, typical of the soaring ambitions of the new Society, was adopted by that Inn. The Middle Temple appropriated another badge, which the Templars had assumed in the thirteenth century. This was the sign of the _Agnus Dei_, the Holy Lamb, with the banner and nimbus, which figures so prominently upon the buildings of this Inn. These heraldic signs of Winged Horse and Holy Lamb should be encouraging to the young litigant, who, in his first experience of the Law, may be led to expect ‘justice without guile and law without delay’ from these legal fraternities, supposing that, in the words of the witty skit,
‘The Lamb sets forth their innocence, The Horse their expedition.’
The Order of Templars followed the almost invariable practice of such Institutions in accumulating treasure at the expense of the devout, and they succeeded more strikingly than most. By the beginning of the fourteenth century they had long abandoned all pretence to the performance of their original duties, but had at least earned the reputation of being exceedingly wealthy. The Treasury, indeed, of these devotees of Poverty was a prominent feature of their House, and they seem to have acted as Bankers, to whom the charge of money and jewels was entrusted in those troublous times.
Here King John stored his Royal Treasury; here he often lodged, seeking refuge from his Barons; and here he passed the night before he signed the Great Charter at Runnymede. Henry III. followed his example in endowing the Temple with manors and privileges, whilst from his guardian, Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent, whom he had imprisoned in the Tower, he extracted all the Treasure that careful nobleman had committed to the custody of the Master of the Temple.
Hither came King Edward I., and under pretence of seeing his mother’s jewels there laid up, this royal burglar broke open the coffers of certain persons who had likewise lodged their money here, and took away to the value of a thousand pounds.
Of the Templars’ Treasure House nothing now remains, but the Treasurer survives, one of the chief officials of the Inn, whose duties correspond roughly to those of a Bursar of an Oxford College.
The laying up of treasure upon earth is always apt to provoke the predatory instinct, even in the breast of a Chancellor of the Exchequer, and to the motive of greed was added, in the case of the Templars, the unanswerable charge that they had done nothing for many years to redeem their vows to succour Jerusalem or protect pilgrims. They were also accused, not without reason, of indulging in odious vices, and of being a masonic society devoted to the propagation of some heresy. The rival fraternity of military Knights, the Order of St. John, who had settled themselves in the rural seclusion of Clerkenwell, envied them. The Pope himself turned against them. Philip le Bel, who seems to have been the leading spirit in a general attack, dealt cruelly with the Order in France, causing the chief Members of it to be put to death. In England Edward II. contented himself with confiscating their possessions. The Order was abolished (1312), and, by decree of the Pope,
confirmed by the Council of Vienne, all their property was granted to the Knights Hospitallers, the rival Order of St. John of Jerusalem. Edward, however, at first ignored their claims. He granted that part of the Templars’ domain which was not within the City boundaries, and which is now represented by the Outer Temple, to Walter de Stapleton, Bishop of Exeter. It was thenceforth known indifferently as Stapleton Inn, Exeter Inn, or the Outer Temple. It passed by purchase to Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex. Essex House was then erected, which, with its gardens, covered the site now occupied by Essex Court, Devereux Court, and Essex Street, and the buildings that abut upon the Strand.
The Gate at the end of Essex Street, with the staircase to the water, is the only portion of the old building that survives. The Outer Temple was never occupied by any College or Society of Lawyers. But the history of the portion of the Templars’ property which lay within the liberties of the City, indicated by Temple Bar, was destined to be very different. This property was granted by Edward II. to Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. On his rebellion the estate reverted to the Crown, and was granted, in 1322, to Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke. He died without issue, and Edward bestowed the property upon his new favourite, Hugh le Despencer, upon whose attainder it passed again to the Crown. At length the claim of the Knights Hospitallers was admitted. For in 1324 Edward II. assigned to them ‘all the lands of the Templars,’ except, of course, some nineteen-twentieths which King and Pope ‘touched’ in transference. The King finally made to them an absolute grant of the whole Temple, apart from the Outer Temple, in consideration of £100 contributed for the wars.
What happened next it is impossible, owing to lack of documentary evidence, with certainty to say. This absence of evidence is partly due, no doubt, to the behaviour of Wat Tyler’s men in 1381, as quoted by Stow. For they not only sacked and burned John of Gaunt’s noble palace, the neighbouring Savoy, but also ‘destroyed and plucked down the houses and lodgings of the Temple, and took out of the Church the books and records that were in Hutches of the apprentices of the law, carried them into the streets and burnt them.’ And later records must have disappeared in other ways, notably in the fire of 1678. Be that as it may, the fact with which everybody is familiar is that the Temple property passed into the occupancy, and finally into the possession, of two Societies of Lawyers, who existed, and still exist, on terms of absolute equality, neither taking precedence of the other, and both sharing equally the Round Church of the Knights Templars. These two Societies or Inns are called after the property of the Knights within the boundaries of the City, which they divided between them--the Inner and the Middle Temple.
Now, the first discoverable mention of the Temple as an abode of lawyers occurs in Chaucer’s ‘Prologue to the Canterbury Tales’ (_c._ 1387). Geoffrey Chaucer himself, a fond tradition would have us believe, dwelt for a while in these Courts, and was a student of the Inner Temple. Be that as it may, he tells us
‘A manciple there was of a Temple ... Of Masters had he mo than thrice ten, That were of Law expert and curious; Of which there was a dozen in that house Worthy to been Stewards of rent and land Of any Lord that is in England,’ etc.
Here, then, we have a clear indication of a Society of Masters dwelling in the Temple, whilst Walsingham’s account of Wat Tyler’s rebellion refers to apprentices of the Law there. But there is nothing to indicate the existence of the two Inns till about the middle of the fifteenth century, when we find references to them in the Paston Letters (1440 _ff._), and in the Black Book of Lincoln’s Inn (1466 _ff._). This does not, of course, prove that there was only one Inn before. Such, however, is the traditional account. ‘In spite of the damage done by the rebels under Wat Tyler,’ says Dugdale, ‘the number of students so increased that at length they divided themselves in two bodies--the Society of the Inner and the Society of the Middle Temple.’ Those who believe this maintain that when, in course of natural development--rapid expansion apparently following the rebels’ onslaught--the original Society had attained an unwieldy bulk and outgrown the capacity of the Old Hall, a split was made. Two distinct and divided Societies, upon a footing of absolute equality, took the place of the parent body. A new Hall was built, but equal rights in the Old Church and the contiguous property were maintained.
This form of propagation by subdivision is common enough, of course, in the vegetable and insect world, but it seems highly improbable in the case of a learned body. It is to me an incredible dichotomy. And it is not necessary to stretch one’s credulity so far. There are indications--faint, it is true, but still indications--of the existence of two Societies of Lawyers settled here on two parcels of land that once belonged to the Knights Templars, and dating from almost the earliest days after Edward’s confiscation.
For, according to Dugdale, who repeats a tradition which is probably correct, the Knights Hospitallers leased the property soon after they had acquired it to ‘divers apprentices of the Law that came from Thavie’s Inn in Holborn’ at an annual rental of £10. This must have been before 1348. For in that year died John Thavye, who bequeathed this Inn to his wife, and described it in his will as one ‘in which certain apprentices of the Law _used_ to reside’ (_solebant_). But there is also evidence of another and earlier settlement of lawyers on this property. Some lawyers, it is recorded, ‘made a composition with the Earl of Lancaster for a lodging in the Temple, and so came thither and have continued ever since.’[14] The Earl of Lancaster, as we have seen above, held the Temple _c._ 1315-1322.
Here, then, we have indications of two Societies of Lawyers settling in the Temple. The first body, holding from the Earl of Lancaster, may reasonably be supposed to have had their grant confirmed by the owners who succeeded him. The Society of the Middle Temple must be considered the successors of those tenants. And this Society Mr. Pitt Lewis, K.C.,[15] has traced to a former home in St. George’s Inn, a students’ hostel mentioned by Stow.
The second body, migrating from Thavye’s Inn, obtained a lease of the part not occupied by the former, at an annual rental of £10, as Dugdale states. And from them are descended the Inner Templars of to-day.
From the time when the Order of the Knights Hospitallers was dissolved, till 1608, these two Societies held these two separate parcels of land direct of the Crown by lease, paying two separate rents. Then they discovered that James I. was beginning to negotiate a sale of the freehold.
The present of a ‘stately cup of pure gold, filled with gold pieces,’ presented by the two Societies, converted the Scholar-Monarch. On August 13, 1608, he granted a Charter to the Treasurers and Benchers of the Inner and Middle Temple, conferring upon them the freehold of the Temple, together with the Church, ‘for the hospitation and education of the Professors and Students of the Laws of this Realm,’ subject to a rent charge of £10, payable by each of the two Societies. In 1673 these rents were extinguished by purchase by the two Societies.
This patent of James I. is the only existing formal document concerning the relations between the Crown and the Inns, though it would be strange indeed if no other grant or patent ever existed. It is preserved in the Church in a chest kept beneath the Communion Table, which can only be opened by the keys held by the two Treasurers. The importance of the patent is, for the purpose of our investigation, that it is based almost certainly upon documents that have disappeared, but which reached back to the original conveyance, and it shows that there were two separate parcels, exacting two separate rents. Moreover, it provided that _each_ Society should continue to pay a rental of £10. Now, if these two Societies represented a division of the one parent body which had come from Thavye’s Inn and held the _whole_ Inner and Middle Temple at a rent of £10, it is hardly conceivable that when this supposed division took place, each Society should have continued to pay the whole rent. The first thing they would have divided, after dividing themselves, would surely have been that rent of £10.[16]
That the theory of a division having taken place early caused much wonderment is shown by a report that was rife in the seventeenth century. This ‘report’ was to the effect that the division arose from the sides taken by the Lawyers in the Wars of the Roses. Those wars, however, took place after the date when there is evidence of the existence of the two Societies. The ‘report’ represents an attempt to explain the existence of the two Societies when their origin was already forgotten, and was perhaps suggested by the fact that it was in the Temple Gardens that Shakespeare placed the famous incident that led to the Wars of the Roses:
‘PLANTAGENET. Let him that is a true-born gentleman, And stands upon the honour of his birth, If he suppose that I have pleaded truth, From off this briar pluck a white rose with me.
‘SOMERSET. Let him that is no coward, nor no flatterer, But dare maintain the party of the truth, Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.
‘WARWICK. This brawl to-day, Grown to this faction in the Temple Garden, Shall send, between the red rose and the white, A thousand souls to death and deadly night.’
In 1732, in order to put an end to many questions of property, an elaborate deed of partition was agreed to by the two Inns, and forms the final authority upon what belongs to each.