Output details

In October 1307 all the brothers of the military religious order of the Temple in France were arrested on the orders of King Philip IV and charged with heresy. In November, King Edward II received orders from the pope to do likewise. This volume provides the first full edition (vol. 1) of the four surviving texts and one fragment of the trial proceedings that followed, together with analytical introduction and annotation. The trial of the Templars is now regarded by most scholars as a political trial, and its proceedings and the propaganda which accompanied it are seen to be of considerable significance in the development of such trials; the trial in the British Isles is particularly illustrative of this. The trial of the Templars was also the first heresy trial in the British Isles, and the proceedings reveal the English episcopate’s attempts to deal with this unprecedented situation, the procedures that were followed and the efforts made to ensure that everything was done correctly. Some differences in procedures can be noted between the provinces of Canterbury and York, and between England, Ireland and Scotland. The testimonies given during the trial contain a wealth of information about religious beliefs among the lay population of the British Isles (both the Templars and outsiders who gave evidence during the trial), national and international mobility of lay religious, the social function of the order of the Temple in the British Isles and its relations with society at large, and the organisation and operations of the order of the Temple at a local, national and international level. Volume 1 contains an introduction to the manuscripts and editorial procedures and the edition of the Latin texts with critical apparatus. The editor reconstructs how the manuscripts were originally compiled from the testimonies taken during the proceedings, and traces the subsequent history of the manuscripts and their publication. Editorial procedure has been meticulous, with square brackets indicating every expansion of the original abbreviated text, enabling readers to appreciate both how the medieval scribes went about their task and how earlier editions have mis-resolved some of the abbreviations. Marginalia have been retained in their correct marginal position, allowing readers to see how the original compliers and later users annotated the texts. The manuscripts are cross-referenced to each other, so that readers can trace for themselves how each version of the testimonies was developed. Nicholson shows that the most concise of the texts, which was preserved only in a fourteenth-century history of London, is almost entirely a reworking of the summary of the English testimonies sent to the papal court in early summer 1311, but carefully adjusted to make the case against the Templars appear more conclusive. Variant readings are noted in the critical apparatus. Material inserted into the manuscript by the medieval copyists from the testimonies taken in France has been compared to the published editions of the original French testimonies. For the convenience of scholars, this new edition is cross-referenced to earlier editions, allowing comparisons to be made.

This is a critical edition with translation of legal records which are a major source for our knowledge of the Templars, inquisitorial procedure and torture in Britain and Ireland in the early fourteenth century. This edition for the first time includes all the known manuscripts (c. 200,000 words). The translation contains extensive explanatory annotations supported by a detailed index with a prosopographical catalogue and a list of Templar properties. The introduction to the scholarly edition surveys how the manuscripts were compiled and transmitted, while the introduction to the translation presents a critical analysis of the evidence provided by these texts.