TEMPLE OF LANNOUEE IN YVIGNAC – CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS

Temple of LANNOUEE in Yvignac

 

The preceptory of the Temple of La Nouée in Yvignac, today Lannouée, is mentioned in 1182, in the charter of Conan IV, Duke of Brittany, under the term Lannoué. According to the times, their name changes to La Noueix, La Nouaye, Lannooeix. The yearning. This word “La Nouée” has Celtic origin, meaning “wet, swampy place”. Indeed, this house was located on an ancient Celtic path that later became the Roman path, ending in the last century in a royal.

 

The chapel, visible today, belonged to Lanhoe Temple. It is located in the diocese of Saint Malo, on the parish of Yvignac, and extended these possessions to the surroundings of Dinan. Three members depended on this preceptory: the Temples of Créhac (Pledran), La Caillebotière (Plurien) and Romillé (in Ille et Vilaine).

 

Placed under the vocabulary of Saint-Jean Baptiste, the chapel of Lannouée would be in the same style and era as the church of Yvignac, built according to the local tradition by the Templars. It was in this chapel of Lannouée that, in 1297, was received Templar Pierre de Launay. He was attended that day by four brothers of the Temple: Hugues Poulet, d’Auvergne, Guillaume Battan and Jean de Fougères.

 

The commander of Lannouée lifted the tithe on all the lands he had in his fief, but also in Yvignac, Trebedan, Corseul, Saint-Carne, Plénée-Jugon, the fief of the Temple, Bourseul, the village of Hospital, Tramain, the village of Croix and the old manor of the Temple, Plouer, Taden, Plorec, mansion called the Temple, Quever and finally in Dinan It is necessary to mention two locations where the Knights of the Temple had rights: Vildé-Guingalan, and Vildé-Goëllo.

 

 

In the short of May 1313, Josselin de Taulay and Geoffroy Bretonneau, royal sergeants, accompanied by Geoffroy Pellion, notary in Saint-Brieuc, went to the preceptorary of Lannouée to take possession of it and hand it over to the Hospitals represented by Jehan de Chalons, commander of La Feuillée, and Guillaume Jamart, Commander of Quesoy. It was later renamed “The Hospital” of Plumaugat.

 

 

In 1395, brother Nicolas Seguin became commander of Lannouée and La Guerche, which resulted in merging the two commanderies. In 1427, brother Nicolas Poitevin asserts his command of La Guerche and La Nouaye. In 1612, the chapel needed some repairs, the farmer general of the commandery undertook “to rebuild and rebuild the chapel and make the required repairs”. (Departmental archives of Vienna. 3H1/169 room 54).

 

 

During the 17th and 18th centuries, the commandery would be abandoned to the care of general farmers. Chapel worship was always celebrated like burials and weddings. The sale of the commandery, as a national good, took place on the 17 rainy year VII of the republic (February 3, 1799). She was sold 3,000 francs to Michel Frère, farmer of the La Salle trade.

 

Prior to this sale, the bell had been taken down and hidden in the village. Subsequently, in 1803, the new owner of the headquarters claimed this bell, but the bell had been handed over to the mayor of Yvignac. The claim was declared inadmissible and since that time, the bell rings today in the Saint-Firmin chapel in Trélée. (Armor Coast Departmental Archives, Series V 3750).

 

 

As indicated in the minutes of the visit of the commanderies of the Guerche and Lannouée, made in 1708 by Ch. De Cherbonneau and preserved in the Archives of Ille et Vilaine, it was still visible on that date: “an altar decorated with a large crucifix surrounded by the statues of Saint John and of Saint Martin, or a magnificent Roman arcade accompanied by two altars that separates the choir from the nose.

 

 

The oldest parts are built using the technique of “stuffed” bricklaying, i.e. filling the space between the granite marbles. Door and window frames fitted with fine grain granite. In the Xe and XI centuries, the chapel is presented as a rectangle ended by a semi-circular apsis pierced through three windows, only one of which remains today. In the South Wall, the walled bay covered with a triangular lense was to be a door giving access to the chapel. The ensemble was supported by flat foothills.

 

 

In the 15th century, the south wall of the apsis is pierced through a window, today it’s bricked, but still visible from the inside. To open this new window the foothill had to be demolished. The gate on the South wall is walled in. The North wall is being reconstructed with a new door that is currently being penetrated into the chapel.

It was in the enlarged nose that in 1935 eight skeletons arranged perpendicularly to the axis of the building were exhumed. In the absence of specific information about this discovery, it is impossible to determine the circumstances of these burials and their dates.

 

At one time the chapel was turned into a cider press. Today it has been restored thanks to the action of the “Friends of the Chapel of Lannouée” association. A visit is possible but an appointment is preferred.

 

 

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BAILE NAN TRODACH – TEMPLE SCOTLAND – CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS

Temple (Scottish Gaelic: Baile nan Trodach) is a village and civil parish in Midlothian, Scotland. Situated to the south of Edinburgh, the village lies on the east bank of the river South Esk.

 

The civil parish has a population of 225 (in 2011).

 

The name “Temple” refers to its historical connection to the Knights Templar. In 1237, the town name was recorded as “Ballentrodoch”, from the Scottish Gaelic Baile nan Trodach, which means “town of the warriors”, again a reference to the Knights Templar.

Pre-Reformation
Historically the Parish of Temple was divided into three portions, the ancient parish of Clerkington, and the chapelries of Moorfoot and Balantrodach. Clerkington was a parsonage held by the monks of Newbattle Abbey, Moorfoot was a chapelry founded by monks from the same institution. Balantrodach on the other hand, was a chapelry of the Knights Templar.

Newbattle Abbey was one of the many buildings built by King William I ( The Lion) Carruthers ancestor.  It was used by the Cistercian Monks and Priests, which is an order that King William built many other Abbey and Chapelry for. 

In 1128, Hugues de Payens, the first Grand Master, met with David I in Scotland and was granted the lands of Balantrodach. In 1128, the Council of Troyes formally recognized the Order. Balantrodach became their principal Templar seat and preceptory in Scotland until the suppression of the order between 1307 and 1312. As Temple, being just to the south of the Firth of Forth, was an area of the country occupied by England at this time, knights were prosecuted, but not all were found guilty. Nearby to the north, politics was even more on their side – Robert the Bruce had been excommunicated, and so was not required to follow papal commands , and at war with England, it has been suggested that he may have been welcoming to powerful and desperate allies.

 

Following 1312 and the Papal bull (edict) entitled Ad providam, King Edward II of England abolished the Templars in both England and Scotland. According to the edict, all Knight Templar property was to be seized and handed over to the control of the Knights Hospitaller, who had a preceptory at Torphichen in West Lothian. Although he was located in Scotia, north of the Firth of Forth, Robert the Bruce, being under interdict at the time, was reluctant to do so.

 

Many Templar Knights may have assimilated within the Hospitallers. But it’s not necessarily the case that the Templars everywhere immediately ceased to be. Indeed, North of the Firth, in Scotland the Order combined with the Hospitallers and continued as The Order of St John and the Temple until the reformation.

“Legend has it that treasure of the Knights Templar was removed secretly from Paris, to be hidden in Temple. A local legend states: ‘Twixt the oak and the elm tree/You will find buried the millions free.’ French legends about the Templar treasure apparently also state that the treasure was taken to Scotland, with the knights landing on the Isle of May, the first island they would encounter in the Firth of Forth. Geographically, this would take them to the mouth of the river Esk, which could take them on to Rosslyn…”

Post-Reformation

Following the Reformation the present parish was formed from the three older divisions. In 1618, it took its name Temple from the preceptory chapel which had by then become the parish kirk.

In the following centuries Temple became a bustling agricultural village, but in recent years it has become a dormitory village for nearby Edinburgh. The current Church was funded by Thomas Creak whose family were leading figures in Temple in the 1820/30s and earlier. The family owned two houses in Temple but also owned a large farming property in Eccles, Berwickshire

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THE SCOTTISH CRUSADERS – CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS

THE SCOTTISH CRUSADERS

The village of Temple. Apart from a pleasant row of cottages and a lovely walk by the river, there is not much to see. But take the clock back to the 12th century and you would have seen the church and base for the Scottish Knights Templars: today, all you can see are a few ruins. Immediately we hear their name we think of the Crusades, a period of warfare, which lasted mainly between 1095 and 1291, but dragged on after that.

 

 

 

On 27th November 1095, Pope Urban II was in full swing. His charismatic call for military action stirred the archbishops and clergy present at the Council of Clermont in France. ‘God wills it!’ he cried out. For over four centuries the church and medieval world had suffered at the hands of marauding Muslim armies bent on global conquest. Islamic forces had been held back at Tours in France by Charles Martel in 732, but by the 9th century Pope Leo IV started to copy the Islamic jihad, promising forgiveness of sin to anyone who fought against infidels. It was a totally unbiblical and unchristian ideology, but it became established as a false doctrine for centuries, leading to later atrocities in the ‘name of Christ’.

 

 

The trigger for the Crusades was the butchering of about 7,000 Christian pilgrims by Arab Muslims, whilst on their way to Jerusalem in 1064-5. This was followed by the constant harassing and murdering of pilgrims by Muslim bands. Voices were calling for armed protection of the pilgrims and for the liberation of the Holy Land from the Muslims. The kings of Europe were bitterly divided against one another, so a neutral charismatic leader had to be raised up to call for a united European response – the Pope was just the figure to do this.

 

 

The medieval writer of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells us that in 1096 ‘there was a very great stir throughout all this nation [England] and in many other nations too, because of Urban who was called Pope’. In 1099 the crusaders took Jerusalem amidst the slaughter of both Muslims and Jews.

 

 

Although there were Scottish crusaders involved in every war, their influence and numbers were not notable, largely because of their concern that the English kings would siphon off Scottish taxes for the crusades for their own purposes, and because they were often at war with the English later on.

 

 

Despite this, nobility like Lagmann, King of Mann and the Western Isles, and Robert de Quincy, led enthusiastic Scottish followers into the fray: other leaders like Patrick, the Earl of Dunbar, the Earls of Carrick and Atholl, the Balliols, Bruces, Mowbrays, Alexander de Seton, Adam de Gordon, and others, played their part.

 

Patrick Dunbar was King William I ( The Lion), Carruthers ancestor, good friend.  Patrick and King William lost sons in Syria.  Hugh de Burgh would lead another group of Carruthers into the Crusades. 

 

(Torpichen)

 

Even King David I was so keen to lead a Scottish army to liberate the Holy Land that he had to be dissuaded by his nobles and people. Instead he made sure the Knights Templar, the protectors of the pilgrims, were granted land and properties at Balantrodoch, today’s Temple (1128), Kirkliston and Maryculter. He also gave land at Torpichen (1150) to the Knights Hospitallers, where part of the original Preceptory still exists today,  

 

 

 

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SPEAR OF DESTINY – CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS

SPEAR OF DESTINY

The Spear of Destiny – sometimes called the Holy Lance – is one of the most revered relics associated with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. But why would a weapon used to stab the son of God while he died on the cross come to be regarded as a sacred item? And even stranger – how did the Roman centurion who wielded the spear come to be a saint, recognized by the church for his holiness?

Spear of Destiny – the beginning

It’s a bizarre story that begins in the Gospel according to Saint John. It’s made clear that Jesus had already died on the cross and then a Roman centurion with a lance “opened his side and immediately there came out blood and water”. This strange liquid mix by the way is believed to denote the combined humanity and divinity of Jesus – blood for the former and water for the latter.

The incident with the spear – also known as the Holy Lance – seems to grow in importance with the telling. In the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, the centurion acquires a name: Longinus.

Nicodemus, by the way, is a pharisee who is mentioned by Saint John in his gospel as somebody who helps with the burial of Jesus. The gospel allegedly written by him was not accepted into the New Testament but the Catholic church embraced the name and you can see a towering statue of “Saint Longinus” at St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican.

As the importance of the Spear of Destiny grew – so did the name of Longinus. Apparently he was almost blind at the time of the crucifixion and after spearing Jesus, the mix of water and blood splashed in his face and gave him his sight back. Not surprisingly, Longinus converted on the spot to Christianity and was then martyred for his faith.

The Spear of Destiny goes on a long journey

As the film here informs you – keeping track of where the Spear of Destiny ended up down the centuries is very confusing. So we have it being owned in the third century AD by an African Roman soldier, called Maurice, who converts his entire garrison to the Christian faith. All of them are put to death by the authorities.

Almost inevitably, it finds its way into the hands of Constantine – the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity and inveterate collector of relics. But then different accounts have it being stolen by Alaric the Goth during his sack of Rome in 410AD or taken by Attila the Hun. By the sixth century, it appears to be with the Byzantine emperor Justinian in Constantinople who sends it to Jerusalem. Where sadly it is seized by the Persians when they conquer the city in the seventh century.

But then the emperor Heraclius retrieves the sacred relic and instals the Spear of Destiny at the Holy Sepulchre but when the forces of Islam approach, it’s back off to Constantinople. Where it remains until the Ottoman conquest in 1453. The victorious sultan, for diplomatic reasons, sends the spear to the Pope in Rome.

Multiple claims to be the real Spear of Destiny

Or is any of this true? Because the Armenians claim they have a Spear of Destiny. And in Vienna today, you can see their claimed Spear of Destiny that for centuries was part of the imperial regalia of the Holy Roman Empire. It went from Nuremburg to Vienna in 1796 as the Holy Roman Empire was under attack from Napoleon Bonaparte.

But then was returned to Nuremburg by Adolf Hitler. However, once he lost World War Two, it was back in Vienna again. Whether Hitler believed the Spear of Destiny had occult power is a subject that lies firmly between fact and fiction as I explain in the film.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXFgCoQIsts

 

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WHY DID THE CRUSADERS STATES FALL IN 1291 – CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS

WHY DID THE CRUSADER STATES FALL IN 1291

The war between the Mongols and the Mamluks in the second half of the thirteenth century would be the catalyst for the downfall of the Crusader States in the Near East.

In the spring of 1291 John of Villiers, master of the Knights Hospitaller, wrote to his subordinate in Southern France to report the final collapse of the kingdom of Jerusalem. The kingdom’s major city of Acre had fallen a few days previously on 28 May to the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt; an event that prompted the evacuation of all its remaining settlements. The Templar master had been killed in the fighting and John himself had been seriously wounded. The other mainland Crusader States – the principality of Antioch and the county of Tripoli – had already fallen so these events marked the end of the territories established almost two centuries previously either during the First Crusade or in its immediate aftermath.

 

Depiction of the fall of Acre in a 14th century manuscript – Bibliothèque nationale de France MS Français 10135 fol, 371r

Many developments contributed to the fall of the Crusader States, but one strand was always the internal divisions within the most powerful of these states, the kingdom of Jerusalem. The kingdom had always been difficult to rule with many different groups seeking to advance their own interests. These included the representatives from the influential Italian mercantile cities of Venice, Genoa and Pisa who constantly sought to strongarm the ruling authorities for additional commercial privileges. Then there were aristocratic factions jockeying with one another for preferment and influence. The military orders of the Templars, Hospitallers and Teutonic Knights generally sought to keep the peace but there were also occasions when they were as likely as anyone else to use their vast resources as political leverage. Then there was the Church, whose leading officials in the kingdom had their own ideas about how the kingdom should be run.

At the centre of all these factions – each clamouring to be heard – was the King of Jerusalem and his High Court, and herein lay the problem. For much of the thirteenth century, the kingdom was ruled by absentee monarchs who attempted to govern via appointed representatives. Back in 1225 the emperor of Germany, Frederick II, became King of Jerusalem through marriage to the reigning king’s daughter. He later travelled to the Kingdom of Jerusalem on crusade where he successfully negotiated the return of the city of Jerusalem by treaty. Nevertheless, Frederick was deeply disliked by many local factions and when he departed from Acre in 1229 he did so under a hail of offal hurled by the city’s butchers.

Frederick never returned to the Crusader States and neither did his son and successor, who inherited this royal title. They sent officials to manage their interests, but these representatives were deeply resented. The outcome was initially a civil war in the 1230s and 1240s, which Frederick’s representatives lost, followed by a long period in which the various other powerbrokers in the kingdom attempted to maintain at least some semblance of stability. The papacy and the military orders in particular worked very hard to maintain the peace and both the kings of Cyprus and the king of Sicily, Charles of Anjou, made efforts to establish control, but neither succeeded in achieving a firm grip on power.

In this condition, the later history of the Kingdom of Jerusalem was punctuated by bouts of violent unrest and the kingdom’s major protagonists never really managed to unify their efforts so as to maximise the kingdom’s defences. This in turn drew criticism upon the Crusader States from commentators in Western Christendom, a problematic situation for the kingdom of Jerusalem given that its deteriorating reputation served to further discourage the already-diminishing number of crusaders setting out for the Eastern Mediterranean.

Map of the Crusader States around 1240 – image by Blue Danube / Wikimedia Commons

These internal problems may have weakened the kingdom, but this was not the most important factor underpinning its ultimate downfall. The Crusader States existed in a wider world that was changing rapidly throughout the thirteenth century. The common peril confronting every society in the Near East was the danger of Mongol invasion. The first Mongol  foray into the region began in 1220 and by the summer of 1260, all the lands lying to the east of the Crusader States had fallen under Mongol control, the northernmost Crusader State, the principality of Antioch, submitting to the Mongols this same year.

In the event the Mongols never staged a full-scale invasion of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Their forces sacked the coastal town of Sidon, in retaliation for a raid by the local lord, but the kingdom’s diplomats seem to have dissuaded the Mongols from further attacks. Even so the Mongols inadvertently contributed to a chain of events that would lead ultimately to the kingdom’s overthrow.

 

The Mongol campaign into the Near East and the Battle of Ayn Jalut in 1260 – image by Map Master / Wikimedia Commons

These developments began in 1260. Unlike the kingdom of Jerusalem, the Mamluk Empire in Egypt – the only other still-independent power in the region – was determined to resist the Mongol advance. Consequently, in 1260 the Mamluks   advanced out from the Nile Delta intent on meeting the Mongols in battle. Fortunately for them, the bulk of the Mongol army had withdrawn to the east by this stage, leaving only a garrison to hold their newly conquered lands in Syria and Palestine.

The Mamluks then met and routed this force at the battle of Ayn Jalut; a notable feat given the Mongols’ remarkable success in battle in previous years. This famous encounter is often presented as a turning point in the history of the Near East, yet of equal importance were the events that occurred immediately afterwards. The act of defeating a Mongol army drew a great deal of attention. Suddenly, the prospect of resisting their seemingly unstoppable forces looked plausible. This in turn persuaded both warriors and cities in the Mongols’ recently-conquered territories to hand themselves over to Mamluk control. Among these, the Mamluks acquired the large and wealthy Syrian cities of Aleppo and Damascus whose governors turned to them for protection.

With these cities under their control, refugee warriors arriving by the day, and new revenues supplementing their existing Egyptian incomes, the Mamluks were able to build an empire comparable in size to that constructed by Saladin – and they did so very quickly. Through these actions, the Mamluks became a great power, far more powerful than the kingdom of Jerusalem. Even so their rise was overshadowed by one overwhelming question – when would the Mongols return?

In later years, the Mamluks maintained a vigilant watch on the Mongol frontier, yet the seasons passed and no Mongol invasion took place. The Mongols did send a few raiding parties and probing forces against Mamluk border strongholds along the Euphrates river, but their leaders were generally too preoccupied with their own internal concerns to do anything more. The Mamluks used these years to build up their forces, fortify their borders, and enhance their trading relations, all in readiness for a Mongol assault that persistently did not arrive.

In the absence of Mongol resistance therefore the Mamluks were free to employ their rapidly growing forces against the Crusader States. Even if the kingdom of Jerusalem’s many factions had laid aside their quarrels they still could not have competed with the huge armies and resources marshalled by the Mamluk sultanate and from the early 1260s onwards their castles began to fall. The Mamluks conquered Antioch in 1268 and the kingdom of Jerusalem had lost all its inland towns and fortresses by the end of 1271.

When the Mongols finally marshalled their armies for an assault on the Mamluk Empire in 1281 the Crusader States were too weak to offer any real assistance. By this time, over two decades had passed since Ayn Jalut and the Mamluks were strong enough to risk battle with the Mongols’ main field army, which they then decisively defeated near the town of Homs on 29 October 1281.

After this new victory, it was really only a matter of time before the Mamluks swatted away the remaining ports of the Crusader States. For a while, these cities survived due to some long-term treaties but then in 1289 the Mamluks conquered Tripoli. They then conquered Acre in 1291, declaring that the kingdom’s truce with their empire had been broken when a group of Muslim merchants were attacked in the port of Acre.

 

In this way, whilst the various authorities of the kingdom of Jerusalem never managed to work together effectively to protect their territories, their petty disputes can only really be captioned as a ‘secondary factor’ in the kingdom’s downfall. Rather, the destruction of the Crusader States took place as a side-show within the far more significant confrontation between the Mamluks and Mongols; a useful task for the Mamluks’ forces to perform when they weren’t required to fend off the Mongols. Having said this, the Mamluks were fully aware of the significance of their achievement in destroying the Crusader States. After all, they had overthrown the territories first erected by the armies of the First Crusade almost two centuries previously. Even so, their primary concern was always to guard themselves against the far greater threat posed by the Mongols.

When news of the kingdom of Jerusalem’s final collapse reached Western Christendom in 1291 it was met with horror and in later decades many planners sketched out grand strategies for the rebuilding of the Crusader States. Nevertheless, the outbreak of major conflicts such as the Hundred Years War, the very evident power of the Mamluk Sultanate, and ultimately the advent of the Black Death ensured that this would never take place.

OFFICIAL AND REGISTEREDL CLAN CARRUTHERS CCIS SINCE 1983-CLAN OF OUR ANCESTORS

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NICHOLAS MORTON

He is the author or editor of several books covering different aspects of Medieval Near Eastern history.

CLAN CARRUTHERS INT SOCIETY CCIS HISTORIAN AND GENEALOGIST

 

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