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Knights Templar

The further career of Brother Thomas Totty

The further career of Brother Thomas Totty

Posted on 11 March 2016 by Helen Nicholson

I have been blogging about this notorious Templar runaway on my gawainsmum blog. This record of the investigation into the debts owed to the Templars in Bedfordshire at Easter 1309 […]

Hertfordshire accounts: Chelsing, Lannock and Dinsley

Posted on 17 February 2016 by Helen Nicholson

I have transcribed the 1308 accounts drawn up for the Templars' former estates in Hertfordshire -- Chelsing, Lannock and Dinsley, and the market dues received from Baldock --  by the […]

The perils of poultry

Posted on 11 February 2016 by Helen Nicholson

In the first few months of 1309 foxes and kites ate half the geese on the former Templar manor at Little Staughton in Bedfordshire: see my blog here.

Cider

Posted on 10 February 2016 by Helen Nicholson

On my 'Gawainsmum' blog I have been commenting on the cider produced on the former Templar estates.

Tithes — when the Templars weren’t exempt

Posted on 20 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

One of the Templars' most famous and notorious exemptions was not having to pay tithes (a tenth of income, paid to the Church). This was a particular complaint against the […]

Women workers on the Templars’ estates

Posted on 19 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

A quick glance through the accounts of the Templars' estates while they were in King Edward II's hands suggests that there were very few women employed. The cook who made […]

Temple Bulstrode: cheese, butter and tallysticks

Posted on 15 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

The Templars' manor of Temple Bulstrode was in Hedgerley parish in Buckinghamshire. Today the site is part of Bulstrode Park, open to the public only once a year, and famous […]

A medieval (horse) tragedy in Shropshire

Posted on 13 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

Alas! In 1311-12 one of the two affers or draught animals at the Templars' commandery at Lydley in Shropshire fell ill with quodam morbo in nervis, an unidentified disease of […]

The Templars at Bristol

Posted on 13 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

Keepers accounts for Bristol 1309-13 in full Everyone who has ever travelled through Bristol Temple Meads is aware that the Templars owned land in Bristol, and Beatrice Lees's edition of […]

Salving the sheep at Cowley and Horspath in 1308

Posted on 13 January 2016 by Helen Nicholson

On Wattpad you can find the ingredients for the sheep's salve used on the Templars' sheep at Cowley and Horspath in Oxfordshire in spring 1308: white grease, quicksilver (the metal […]