Barbara FraleBesprekingen

Mostly good basic background on who the Knight Templars were and how they started and ended. I still want to learn more. I'm pretty sure there is no real connection to modern groups who use the name and the ancient one that started with the Crusades and ended about 1312. There are a lot of crazy legends out there!

Not a literary classic but you never know whether to blame translator, the author, or both. However, this is the first Templar book without any mystical Dan Brown sort of conspiracy theory through the ages bullshit. It’s just the facts. Frale has a bias towards the Vatican side of things but she doesn’t gloss over the blemishes in the Military Orders. The Templars are revealed for what they are, a holy military order. They were the best of a rotten lot of Crusaders. If you were a woman or child you would much rather face a Templar or Hospitaler than the average Frankish Crusader, if you know what I mean.

In short a good book if you want the basic facts and no fantasy.

Before I go, Frale points out that many modern “societies” claim descent from the Templars, who’s first vows were celibacy and poverty. When was the last time you saw a Shriner or Mason that was celibate and destitute?

Notre Dame holds a special place in my heart. When I visited it in 2014, it took my breath away. When it burned in 2019, the world lost a treasure.

This book is part apocalyptic - with the Antichrist prophesied to come from the tunnels below Notre Dame - but mostly political thriller.

It was fun to read a book that was set outside of the usual time periods. The downside to not being familiar with this period in history is that the characters started to blend together at times. Dante (the author of Dante’s Inferno) was the only character I’d heard of before. The author extensively researched this period, and at times gave more history than was necessary.

This author was at her best when describing the love triangle between Joan of Navarre, the king and Matilda. I wish we had a little more of that.

King Phillip seeks the return of a physician who holds the key to solve his biggest problem - which isn’t what it seems at first. But that physician has taken refuge with the Pope, who is not friendly to the King. Many men seek to try to solve it, but in the end, it’s a woman who triumphs.

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Scorrevole e interessante, senza essere appassionante½

The translation is quite spotty in places, done by an outfit "Corporate Translation Services," whatever that is. The writing is a bit academic and choppy in spots. The gist builds off two prongs: (1) Frale's complete immersion and knowledge of Templar documents, many that scholars have not really accessed before (and many that escape the view of English readers); and (2) the theory of Ian Wilson's that between the time the Shroud/Mandylion was looted from Constantinople in 1204 (during the Fourth Crusade) and it's appearance in France in the mid-1300s, it was in the care of the Templars. Frale builds on earlier theories and connects it to documents to come up with some pretty good circumstantial evidence that the Templars did indeed have the Shroud and venerated it as a relic, almost as an idol, which got them in trouble come Philip of France in 1307. For instance, she maintains that the "head" that the Templars supposedly confessed to "worshiping," under torture, mind you, was, in reality, painted copies of the Shroud's head (like the copies of Mandylion venerated in Eastern Orthodoxy as icons).

Frale makes a pretty good case, though it is a bit difficult to follow and roundabout. Frale is definitely not a popular history writer, like Ian Wilson, but she is a thorough scholar, so the book drags from time to time. But, diligent readers and researchers will benefit from careful study of the thesis. Frale is not as good as others (Wesselow, for instance, more recently, or Wilson, for instance) in showing that the Shroud is an authentic, first century artifact, but she does so competently enough. The meat of this book is to show that, indeed, the Templars had something that was probably the Shroud, that they got it (through many hands) from Constantinople (i.e., it was the Mandylion), and that when the Shroud appeared in the mid-1300s in France, it was in the hands of Templar-related families.

Again, Frale's writing is not the smoothest, nor is the translation, but it is a fine addition to the story of the Shroud of Turin. Kudos for proper footnotes for citations. It has a nice bibliography (lots of books in Frale's native Italian, which opens up whole new scholarly vistas for English-speaking enthusiasts of the Shroud). It has a serviceable index. A few pictures, but could use quite a number more (nota bene, the paperback edition has color plates yet the hardcover edition has black-and-white images, which makes no sense). For instance, the Templecombe face of Christ, which is a very Shroud/Mandylion-looking face found in a Templar church, is mentioned several times in the text, but no image of it appears in the book.

Still, a fine addition to the story of the Shroud of Turin, connecting Constantinople in 1204 to France in the mid-1300s via the Knights Templar.½

It’s hard for me to decide what I think about this book. For virtually my entire life, I’ve heard and read rumors, stories, and myths about the mysterious Knights Templar, and most people know about the Holy Grail and have heard stories that the organization continues to secretly exist to the present day. When I got this book, I wasn’t exactly looking for or expecting to find these stories were justified. However, while I admittedly did enjoy learning about how the Templars were founded, and for what reasons, and the qualities one had to have and the sacrifices one had to make in order to become one, this book then quickly turned into basically a dry textbook of history, places, several events, politics, culminating in a very disappointing (for me) end to what had been an admirable organization, complete with confessions tortured out of the Templars who had been arrested due to political BS between the King of France and the Pope. It was further disappointing to learn that at least some of the confessions were true, as in the Templars’ secret initiation rites, which I cannot believe were original, had degraded into something undeserving of the name and purpose of the organization, and personal requirements and standards had been lowered to recruit new members, thus making for a lack of morals in some that would have probably gotten an original Templar killed by his fellows. It was also disappointing to learn of such a once-splendid organization’s demise, and as the primary author was granted access to the “secret” Vatican files, it’s highly likely that the reports of its termination as an organization are and were indeed true, thus destroying my youthful fantasies of a super-secret organization existing over the centuries to the present, exercising power in all sorts of areas. Like I originally stated, I knew that was essentially a myth, but it was still disappointing to read the historical truth.

This is a well-researched, and professionally written history of a fascinating organization that was quite powerful for several hundred years and which still interests numerous people til this day. The writing gets fairly dry at times, even boring, but there’s enough good details and history in it to make it worth reading. I’d give this book a solid four stars and state that it’s recommended.

Molto interessante e ben scritto, spiega le ragioni delle dimissioni di Celestino V e l'ascesa di Bonifacio VIII.

This is mostly a history of the hidden years of the Shroud of Turin. It is more history of the Knights Templars and their taking care of the shroud. It does not try to answer the veracity of the shroud, but to lay out the various types of research and theorizing on the shroud. A little too detailed for me, but a good book.

This book was disappointing. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't good either. With this subtitle: "The Secret History Revealed," you thought it was going to more squarely address the whole spate of Templar myths that have cropped up in the wake of Holy Blood, Holy Grail and the literary abortions of Dan Brown and his ilk. Thing is, aside from some oblique references by Eco in the forward (another reason I bought it), and parts of the last chapter, it was just a beefed-up Wikipediaesque recap of Templar history. Again, not bad, but not what I was expecting. Also, for the woman who discovered the Chinon parchment, you'd expect her to mention it more than just the few references in the last chapter. Eh. Enlightening, however, was her analysis of the controversial initiation ceremonies, which was actually quite sparkling. Also, it'd be nice to have a chronology, or a list of Grand Masters, or the like. One bright spot was the extensive bibliography that was almost a bibliographic essay, though it was lean on English-language works. Could have been brilliant, instead it serves an accessible primer, good, but not great.½

Nato dall'iniziativa di alcuni cavalieri che si erano votati al Santo Sepolcro di Gerusalemme, quello dei Templari divenne in pochi decenni l'ordine religioso-militare più potente della cristianità. Professionisti della guerra e uomini di religione, protettori dei pellegrini in Terra Santa, i cavalieri del Tempio divennero, grazie al favore dei papi e dei re cristiani, un organismo sovranazionale attivo in tutto il Mediterraneo. L'accusa di eresia rivolta da Filippo il Bello per impadronirsi dei beni dell'ordine, indusse Clemente V a sciogliere il Tempio per evitare uno scisma della chiesa francese da Roma. Questo studio ricostruisce la storia dei Templari avvalendosi di ricerche originali che hanno condotto anche a clamorose scoperte.

Ho letto questo libro per motivi di lavoro e ho ascoltato l'autrice parlarne a un convegno. L'opera non è solo piacevole da leggere, ma anche e soprattutto utile per spazzare via un sacco di pregiudizi accumulatisi nel corso dei secoli sull'ordine templare (vedi Dan Brown e simili).

I've read this book because of my work and I've listened to the author speaking about it at a meeting. The book is not only entertaining to read, but also and most of all useful to clear off of all the prejudices that all through the centuries have been attached to the Temple order (see Dan Brown and such).