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Knights Templar

The Everyday Life of the Templars: update

20 July 2016
Helen Nicholson

Helen Nicholson

Some readers of this blog will know that the data from these pages will form a central part of my forthcoming book The Everyday Life of the Templars, contracted to Fonthill Media. The first draft of the book is now complete; the text now needs the usual proof-reading and tidying.

Comments

3 comments
  1. Jan Eskildsen

    Hi Helen N.

    I wonder if you can help me.
    According to en.wikipedia (no good) and de.wikipedia (better) the Knight Templars got Süpplingenburg /Supplingen)  of henry the Lion in 1173 after his participation in a short crusade trial in 1172.
    Some words also that already Lothar built it for them in 1130 but no documents. i have not been able to find newer reliable sources, but hints to some books from before 1st world war, so I wonder what the real story is. It is not mentioned by Barber and Bates in The Templars.

    • Helen Nicholson

      Hello Jan: so far as I know, the standard work on the Templars’ properties in Germany is still Michael Schüpferling, Der Tempelherren-Orden in Deutschland: Dissertation zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde von der philos Fakultät der Universität Freiburg in der Schweiz(Bamberg: Dr J. Kirsch, 1915).
      Schüpferling suggests, pp. 87–88, that in 1173, after his return from the Holy Land, Henry the Lion gave the Templars his castle of Süpplingenburg and a site in the city of Brunswick with the church of St Katherine, which he had built.
      However, on p. 91, he states that the commandery of Supplingenburg / Supplingburg, north of Heimstedt, was called by Hans Prutz (in Die Geistlichen Ritterorden (Berlin: E. S. Mittler und Sohn, 1908), p. 335) the oldest commandery in lower Germany, because the emperor Lothar gave it to the Order before 1130; but he then goes on to point out that Wohlbrück states that the charter evidence does not begin before the start of the 13th century. It has also been suggested that Henry the Lion founded it.
      On pp. 240–41 he set out a list of all the properties that the Templars held in Germany and the dates when they acquired them. On this list (p. 240), Süpplingenburg is listed as having been received by the Templars in 1130.
      So: it is not clear when the Templars acquired Süpplingenburg. You can find Prutz’s work online at archive.org — you will see that his statements about ‘Supplinburg’ are not referenced to any sources.

  2. Jan Eskildsen

    Hello Helen – thank you very much for your time and useful answer.

    all the best

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