Templar Fortresses: The Architecture of Power - Full Documentary

The Templars. The dazzling rise and brutal fall of this religious order shaped the Middle Ages. To demonstrate their incredible political, economic and religious power, the Templars constructed exceptional buildings throughout the Christian world. In the Holy Land, but above all, in Europe. Fortifications, churches, castles. Their countless innovative structures span from the hearts of western cities to the remote countryside. The entire architecture reflects the paradoxical image of the Templars, who were both priests and warriors. Nearly 1,000 years later, these structures stand in testimony to the Templars' incredible construction skills. What avant-garde military techniques did they build into their massive fortresses in Spain and Portugal? The Tomar Glacis is a slope that enables to keep enemies from sapping the fortress. The castles were built with siege engines in mind. In London, what sacred form inspired the Temple Church, a jewel of religious architecture? By building this, you recreate the shape, and clearly, in some sense, you recreate the sanctity of the sepulchre. In Paris, they built a small independent city, an impressive wall, and a monumental keep. All have disappeared without a trace. The famous Temple Keep was an extremely powerful and symbolic monument. It was simply massive. Why did they build this impressive structure in one of the most remote parts of France? It's quite an exceptional site because it gives a good idea of what a fortified commandery might have looked like in the 13th century. Through the latest archaeological research, spectacular 3D reconstructions, and interviews with leading international experts, we're about to reveal the secrets of the Templars' constructions, whose stones still attest to their incredible power. Jerusalem. It was here in 1120 that a handful of knights created the Order of the Knights Templar. They aimed to protect Christian pilgrims and defend the Holy Land, which they had taken from the Muslims during the Crusades. The militia quickly became very powerful, thanks to support from kings, nobles, and the Pope. Donations of land, castles, and money flooded in from all over Europe, and within a few decades, the Knights Templar found themselves in possession of significant assets. They were constantly adding to their holdings, covering the Western world with military and religious buildings, all symbols of their power. Today, the most stunning remains of this massive undertaking can be found on the Iberian Peninsula, notably in the form of a series of emblematic fortifications. Contrary to common belief, most of the Templars' castles were not built in the Holy Land itself, but rather 3,000 kilometers away, in Spain and Portugal, where they erected nearly 80 castles. Like the Holy Land, Spain was the setting of a conflict between Christians and Muslims, and castles played an essential role in defending the population. In medieval times, the Iberian Peninsula was a borderland, where the north belonged to the Christian kingdoms, while the middle and the south belonged to the Muslim states, which were originally much more powerful. The conquest was gradually moving farther and farther south, allowing Christian states to grow and expand over time. The Templar fortresses contributed to this movement by helping Christian kings consolidate the lands they had conquered. In the Temple province of Portugal, the arrival of Guadim Pais in 1156 marked the start of a new era in military construction. He spent five years fighting all across the Holy Land, where he had the opportunity to learn about the techniques used by the Muslims and the Crusaders. When he returned as the Temple Master of the province of Portugal, he began to introduce all manner of military and architectural innovations. Through an unprecedented construction program, he created a spectacular, unparalleled network of castles. It is in Tomar, the seat of the Templar province of Portugal, that the most impressive example of these fortifications can be found. From 1160 to 1170, the Portuguese Templars dedicated all their building efforts to erecting this massive wall, measuring 700 meters long and 10 meters high. From a military perspective, Tomar became the Templars' most important fortification, because of a series of military structures that were relatively new to the territory of Portugal. The first of these structures is the glacis, a steep, bare slope that surrounded the 700 meters of walls. The glacis of Tomar Castle is really immense. It surrounds the entire structure, the whole castle, and it's extremely high. The result of a colossal construction site, it's the largest Templar glacis in Portugal. This large crown of stone, measuring 7 to 8 meters high and just as wide, provides highly effective protection against siege engines. When the Templars came into contact with the Latin beast, they discovered that the Muslim powers had developed a highly sophisticated technique of sapping and mining. This technique consisted of digging a ditch, protected by wooden logs, all the way up to the enemy fortress. Next, they would make holes in the foundations to cause the walls to collapse, then penetrate through the breach. The slope and the perfectly interlocking stones of the glacis reinforced the stability of the walls and prevented attackers from reaching the foundations. Moreover, it guarded against any possibility for the enemies to take shelter from arrows or to approach the wall with siege engines capable of destroying the walls. It also put defenders in a better position to protect themselves by hurling projectiles that would ricochet down the slope and hit the attackers. The protection provided by the glacis was all the more effective as the ramparts were reinforced by an impressive series of towers of various shapes and sizes. These towers projected out from the walls, making it easier for archers to aim and shoot more effectively. They could use the towers to attack enemies who might be trying to climb the walls and to shoot from the sides, from behind and from above, giving them more angles to aim from. The glacis, the ramparts and the towers already provided a significant level of protection. But in the event that an enemy managed to get through them, the Templars also had other defenses in place. A castle perched on the hilltop that featured the nerve center of the fortress. The Keep. It was the first keep ever built in Portugal. The Keep was the ultimate defense of recess. But at the same time, it was an eminent place of power where Portugal's temple master most likely resided and ruled. The Keep was the best constructed and tallest in the castle. It was also a command center because it had a view of the entire castle. Four stories and over 20 meters tall, the Keep was designed to withstand even the most determined attackers. Its location overlooking the rest of the castle meant that it could defend not only the sides of the castle, but also the entrances in the inner bailey. The absence of windows or doors on the ground level meant there were no weak points for enemy attackers. In the case of an attack, they'd remove the ladder from the door, which was elevated high off the ground and therefore difficult to reach. The top of the main tower was reinforced by a wooden structure called a hoarding, which was supported by notches carved into the stones of the Keep. Inhabitants could use this sort of defensive balcony to launch projectiles and arrows down on any attackers who had reached the bailey and might be threatening the door, all the while remaining safely under cover. The Keep's sophisticated design was another innovation brought back from the Holy Land, the result of a surprising process of military acculturation between East and West. The concept of a Keep was imported from the West and from France. There, the locals made improvements and perfected the design, in particular with regard to the ramparts, which is where Guadalim Pache got the ideas he later brought back to Portugal. In traditional castles, the Keep was in the center of the fortification. That wasn't a very strategic location, which is why it was known as passive defense. In the case of active defense, the Keep was moved closer to the wall and, most importantly, closer to the castle's main door, in order to better protect the castle ramparts. All these innovations proved to be extremely effective when the powerful Almohad army attacked the fortress in 1190. There's an inscription on Tomar Castle that describes the Muslims' attack and mentions the large number of enemy attackers. The castle was surrounded for six days. Everything seems to indicate that the structure built in Tomar withstood the siege of Almohad Caliphate, or possibly that the Caliph retreated after realizing the castle was too well defended to be taken. Five years after this final battle, Guadalim Pache died at the impressive age of 75, and his body was buried in the church of Santa Maria do Olival de Tomar, the pantheon of the Portuguese Knights Templar. His death marked the end of the golden age of the Knights Templar in the region, who now had to compete with other military orders. Surprisingly, 800 years later, it's not the military part that holds the most fascination for visitors, but rather the religious part, thanks to another impressive Templar construction, the church, which was built between the 12th and the 13th century. This rotunda, with its thick walls and buttresses that make it a veritable tower, is a reminder of the central role that religion played in the Templars' lives. The construction of a rotunda shows that the castle was designed to include a convent, making Tomar into a fortified convent. The rotunda is located at one corner of the ramparts and seems to have been designed to play a potentially defensive role as well. While the spectacular interior decorations were added later, the architecture of the building was definitely designed by the Knights Templar themselves. Some historians believe it was meant to imitate the Templum Domini, now the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, a Muslim sanctuary that was turned into a church by the crusaders. The exterior of the Tomar Rotunda has a total of 16 sides. The 16 sides correspond to the inside of the Templum Domini. And what's interesting is that the exterior of the Templum Domini is an octagon, whereas in Tomar that octagon is found inside. Therefore, it's as if the Templars had created an opposite of the Templum Domini in this rotunda. The religious part was added on to over the centuries by the Military Order of Christ, who succeeded the Knights Templar, turning Tomar into a majestic architectural edifice, the largest set of cloisters in Europe. At the other end of the Iberian Peninsula, some 800 kilometers away in Catalonia, and in the mid-12th century, the Templars built another one of their most iconic fortresses, Miravet Castle. This is one of the most remarkable Templar fortresses on the Iberian Peninsula, undoubtedly the best preserved from the Crown of Aragon, and it's a very good example of the massive castles the Templars were capable of building. Built on the top of a towering rocky outcropping, this massive fortress demonstrates the strategic importance of the location. Standing on the Muslim border, Miravet was both a war zone and one of the most important Templar centers in the region, as well as a decisive control point for the river that flows at its base. The Ebro is the largest river in Catalonia, and for that reason, it needed to be protected, because the river was a border and also used to transport all kinds of goods from the north to the Mediterranean. For protection, this Templar site features a double wall that goes almost all the way down to the river. Naturally, it was built against the rock face that offered a highly effective natural protection, but that was not the main reason this site was chosen. What makes Miravet unique is that it was the site of a contemporary Muslim castle, called a hissn, that the Templars received as a gift from the King of Aragon. The design of Miravet respects the layout they inherited. The Templars used the design of the Muslim fortress, traditionally divided into three different spaces. The upper part, that of the Andalusian castle, was replaced by a Templar castle. The lower courtyard, where the Muslim population sought refuge in case of danger, was also preserved, as can be seen in the remains of the walls. Finally, the Muslim residential quarter was preserved throughout the Templar period, but has since disappeared. Miravet, like Tomar in Portugal, is a testimony to a unique architectural style born of the conflict between Christians and Muslims. Historians long questioned which parts were actually built by the Templars, until the archaeological dig that took place in 2010. They were surprised to find the original Andalusian wall made of rammed earth. Rammed earth is a type of masonry that uses dirt that has been compacted inside in a wooden frame. Each of these clay blocks, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, constituted the Andalusian wall. The Templars destroyed it to use it as backfill and built a new wall made of stones. We discovered that all of that had been done by the Templars. We used to think they had only repurposed the Andalusian wall. And so it was indeed the Templars who placed these perfectly carved stones, joined together in the colors of the order, black and red. They wanted to raise the Andalusian constructions to build new ones out of stone, because stone was a harder, more noble material, so it was meant to represent the new feudal power in Miravet. Using these construction techniques, the Templars were able to build this castle, which is of particularly impressive size when seen from the sky. Even if several of the buildings have been damaged or destroyed. For example, the main entrance had a large tower above it, which played a crucial role. Standing three stories tall, not only did it provide protection for the door in case of an attack, but it also housed a secret room between two floors, hidden by a trap door, where the Templars hid the treasure of the province. The upper wall of the castle is perfectly preserved. This soaring stone structure, 27 meters tall, and measuring up to 5 meters thick in some places, protected the only side of the fortress that did not have a natural defense. The most extraordinary part about Miravet might be the thickness of the walls. They're what made it possible to build the rooftop terraces, which are so interesting and significant at such dizzying heights. The defenders could set up siege engines on them, as was common practice in the Holy Land. These engines were used by the defenders to bombard the attackers, but the latter could also use their own to break down the walls. These two opposing uses clearly impacted the architecture of medieval fortifications. It meant that they had to build structures with large vaults to support the weight of these terraces, where they would place their siege engines. They also had to build very thick walls to withstand the siege engines used by attackers. But over the course of its history, Miravet was never attacked by the Muslims, and the Templars focused on their mission to populate and exploit the vast territories around them, along with their daily religious life. Miravet's architecture serves as a reminder of just how much the Brothers' days were structured by prayer. We can see many elements of the Templars' religious and community life. For example, there's a very large reflectory where the Templars ate together in silence while listening to someone read the scriptures. The Templar castle is like a convent. There was a chapel 22 meters long and 8 meters wide, which they could access from the refractory via a gallery that acted as a cloister. For 150 years, the religious buildings outlined the days of the Brothers, who lived here in peace. Until suddenly, one morning in February 1308, they had to retreat behind their walls to defend themselves against an unexpected enemy. For several months, the Templars in Europe had been targeted by a plot, and more and more of them were being arrested. Even in this remote region, troops were approaching to arrest them. It's paradoxical that a castle built to defend the border with the Muslims became a place of refuge where the Knights Templar from all over the country sought protection from the king. Surprisingly, the castle was still fortified, and they had weapons and siege engines in perfect working order. But this time, they would be used against the king's soldiers. The Templars resisted, and even bombarded their enemy brothers with their siege engines, destroying the village at their feet. They withstood the siege for around a year, and it was only at the end, when they were exhausted, sick, and had no food or water left, that they finally decided to yield. The imprisoned Templars were finally pardoned four years later, after the entire Templar order had been abolished. Like most of the Temple's European possessions, the Miravet Fortress was given to the Knights Hospitaller, another military order. It shows that the Templars' border fortresses in Aragon had a military value that they retained throughout their history. But the Templars didn't just build fortifications in remote battle zones to defend new territories. They also fought for prestige and power in cities. Approximately 1,000 km from Miravet, in the heart of Europe, the order had an essential hub. Paris, the seat of the Templar province in France. The province of France in the West was probably the largest, most important and undoubtedly the richest province in the order. As a result, the architecture of the Parisian commandery was uniquely symbolic and ostentatious. Surprisingly, historians don't know much about the Paris Temple, indeed very little, and whose impressive buildings no longer stand today. But using brand new 3D reconstructions, we're about to show you how the Temple complex was built, complete with an impressive wall surrounding numerous buildings and two powerful towers. The Templars, whose main headquarters were in Jerusalem in the Holy Land, had to display just how important they were in their primary location in Western Europe. That's why they built an imposing complex, the size of which was unrivaled anywhere in Europe. It all started with the lightning-fast establishment of a sizable presence in medieval Paris, which was much smaller than the Paris of today. Thanks to significant donations, later complemented by clever acquisitions, within 20 years they became the second largest landowners in Paris, and only the mighty bishop. In 170 years, the Templars managed to take possession of one-tenth of the city of Paris, a sign of their amazingly fast and impressive rise to power. By the 1140s, they owned properties in the heart of the city on both banks of the Seine. Donations flooded in, from houses to mills and even ports. The way the Templars settled in the city was very well thought out. They tried to establish ties with the powers that be, notably the king, but also to use their assets to their best economic advantage. For example, the port played a very important role. They used it to transport supplies to the capital from their properties outside of Paris. Over time, as the medieval city filled up, they expanded onto the agricultural lands outside its border. First, they built the walls around the temple, then they founded the Ville Nouve de Temple, where the famous Marais neighborhood stands today. They were the ones who designed the grid system of the streets. They created a whole new city there. The network created by the temples is still visible today. Their implantation took the form of a massive temple complex in the middle of the 12th and the end of the 13th century. The crenelated wall around it was 8 meters tall, 700 meters long, and reinforced with some dozen small towers. The entrance, which was protected by a drawbridge, was fortified by two towers. Inside this surrounding wall were a number of buildings, starting with a church with a round nave and an immense choir nearly 40 meters long and 20 meters tall. It was joined by an impressive cluster, a chapel, living quarters for the brothers, a hospital, a farm and even a prison. But most importantly, the complex was dominated by two imposing towers. The first was built in the second half of the 12th century. Caesar's Tower was an impressive sight. There were no other fortified buildings like it in Paris. We know very little about this building, which has been brought back to life today via 3D reconstruction. It was a square tower measuring 9 meters on each side and nearly 25 meters tall, with a crenelated platform on top that was later replaced by a roof. The walls, which were reinforced with buttresses, and the massive interior vaults made it into an impressive safe where the temple's treasure was stored. Medieval treasures consisted of silver and jewels. They also contained archival documents, books and manuscripts, as well as relics from saints, which were also very valuable on an economic level. The Knights Templar received large monetary donations right from the start, not only from the king, but also from many lords, sometimes even from the Pope. As a result, they needed fortresses to keep those large sums of money safe. But this tower was only the beginning of the demonstration of the power of the Templars. Around 100 years later, they would build an even more colossal edifice. To the Parisians, the Temple Keep, the large tower, became a familiar sight. By the end of the Middle Ages and throughout the modern age, the building can be seen in the background of a number of miniatures, engravings and prints. It stood out from the rest. We don't know of any other contemporary building as tall as this one. The only one that could compare was Notre-Dame Cathedral. Because of its large size, the Keep was soon nicknamed the Big Tower by the Parisians, and it became a symbol of the Knights Templar in the city. The proof of how important the tower was to the Templars is that they put it on the seal of the Paris Temple Commandery. A seal back then was a bit like a logo today. Calling its dimensions exceptional is no exaggeration. The main part of the building was a square tower, measuring 13.5 meters on each side and four stories tall. On the top was a crenellated rampart walk, itself covered by a pyramidal roof that reached nearly 50 meters. The four corners were reinforced by round towers over five meters across and topped with conical spires for a total height of nearly 45 meters. It was probably in these towers that the Templars stored their treasure. We know that the tower was truly exceptional from a defensive point of view. We don't know much about the windows, but they were probably arrow slits. The walls were around three meters thick. For a sense of scale, the tower was larger than the already impressive royal fortress of the Louvre, which had been built by Philip II of France a few decades earlier, itself being larger than Caesar's tower. These castles and towers were a representation of the power of the people who owned and lived inside them. In the case of the Paris Temple Tower, it symbolized their pride, power and wealth, both in the West and in the Holy Land. So how can one explain that these monumental edifices built by the Templars simply disappeared off the map of the French capital? The Paris Temple was marked by two twists of fate. In just a few years, everything changed. The arrest warrant for the Templars of the Kingdom of France, which was issued on the morning of Friday, October 13th in 1307, went into effect for Paris and the rest of the kingdom at the same time. More than 100 brothers were captured inside the temple. These arrests were followed by the torture and by the death of many Templars, often in prison. The fate of the Paris Temple was tied to the disappearance of the order in 1312 by the death of its last master, Jacques de Molay, who was burned at the stake on May 11th, 1314. The second twist of fate came 500 years later, when Napoleon ordered the tower of the temple to be destroyed. It had been used to imprison the royal family during the Revolution and he feared that royalists would turn it into a pilgrimage site. The rest of the buildings inside the enclosure were razed over the course of the 19th century. But the building power of the Knights Templar wasn't solely expressed through these large-scale constructions. It also shaped, each day, on a local and rural scale, buildings, churches, villages and territories all over Europe. The order needed huge sums of money to fund their fight in the Holy Land. So they developed a remarkably effective economic system, organizing the territories of the West into provinces, each of which included several commanderies. They were charged with managing even the most remote areas of the West, such as here, in Saint-Eulalie-des-Sarnons on the Lasac plateau, where the church and other buildings constructed by the brothers more than 800 years ago still stand today. Saint-Eulalie was one of the most important commanderies in southern France. The first written records of its presence date back to 1140 or 1150, and little by little the Templars spread to other areas, finally taking over a vast territory on the Lasac plateau, which extended approximately 80 kilometers around Saint-Eulalie. Considering the size of their territory, the Templars tried to simultaneously obtain grain, products from the forest, livestock animals and wine. It was a vast network of people. There were the brothers themselves, numbering around 15 in Saint-Eulalie, but also the laborers who worked for the Templars. That was also part of the purpose of a commandery, to create an extensive economic infrastructure that would sustain the territory. The Templars' implantation in Lasac picked up speed in 1159, when the most powerful man in the region, Raymond Berenger, Count of Barcelona, Prince of Aragon and Viscount of Millau, ceded his land in the Lasac to the Temple. In just over 50 years, the commandery extended its reach across nearly 250 square kilometers. The lords and landowners who made donations to the Temple were motivated by the salvation of their souls. As good Christians, their top priority was to ensure their passage into heaven by being charitable and donating to religious orders. The Templars' success in the 12th century was rooted in their unique way of following religion, which, for the first time in Christian history, combined prayer with warfare. The Templars led the way in that revolution. The warrior aristocracy saw it as a way to ensure their salvation without giving up their way of life, which was based on combat. It was this religious fervor that enabled the Templars to move into La Couverture, 25 kilometers from Saint-Eulalie-des-Renonts, in the late 1100s. The local lord gave his land to them out of love for God and to atone for his sins. In the middle of nowhere, the order built this imposing fortified manor house from the ground up, which the knight-hospitaliers would later reinforce with a series of ramparts in the 14th century. It's quite an exceptional site because it gives a good idea of what a fortified commandery may have looked like in the late 13th century. What's amazing about La Couverture is that it's remained in good condition and wasn't dismantled over the course of the modern era. Perched atop a rock overlooking the surrounding area, a fortified wall up to 13 meters tall, pierced with arrow slits, surrounded an imposing tower nearly 20 meters long and 9 meters wide. The Templars went to great length to erect this building, even though it was probably inhabited by just two or three brothers. They built the castle into the rock with a lot of care. The laborers who worked here at La Couverture built their walls out of stones that had been carefully carved and assembled them using very hard mortar. They wanted it to be really strong and durable. The ability to build a structure like this implies considerable financial means, as well as a network of connections, meaning the ability to attract master craftsmen and workers who were qualified to build a structure like this. In the late 13th century, the castle was even more impressive than it is today. The keep was probably two stories higher. And the large surrounding wall, which has been partially destroyed today, was preceded by a first wall built a few decades earlier. The fortified manor house of La Couverturade was there to tell the inhabitants of the region that the territory was under the power of the Knights Templar. They were the real lords of the area. Yet the Templars' power in the region was primarily expressed by the way they extended its reach on the neighboring territories further and further with each passing day. In order to produce the wealth they needed to defend the Holy Land, the brothers were constantly striving to develop their economic activity on a local scale. The Larzac, a gigantic plateau covering almost 1,000 square kilometers at 800 meters of elevation, was eventually owned almost exclusively by the Knights Templar. Their primary source of income was livestock farming, and they were undoubtedly doing it on a much larger scale than the local lords. By the end of the 13th century, they had thousands of animals, which was considerable. The Knights Templar obviously produced wool and pelts, but also dairy products, and in particular cheese, which would become the famous Roquefort. Here, as elsewhere, the brothers showed extraordinary management skills, constantly dealing in properties in order to keep adding to their already extensive holdings. The brothers bought, traded and sold land, properties and rights to rationalize and organize the space so as to optimize the efficiency of their production. Through the structures they built and the land they managed, the implantation of the Templars in the Larzac demonstrates the ideological and strategic strength deployed by the Knights Templar to achieve their goal, even in the most rural parts of Europe. A rural Templar at La Corvelle-Torade was well aware that he was 100% Templar, just as much as the Templars who were leading the fight in the Holy Land. From a commandery deep in the Rohe, the Templars were in a position to send a number of things to the Holy Land via large Mediterranean ports such as Marseille, namely supplies and even money. While La Corvelle-Torade may have embodied the development of the Templars' economic power, nearly 1,000 kilometers away in London, the seat of the English province, one church served as a reminder that religion was the source of their power, the exquisite Temple Church. When it was new, this would have been the height of the newest fashion. The architects built what is the first Gothic building built in England. It would have been by that very fact a real statement of the Templars' arrival. Around 1160, just outside London, the Templars constructed a set of buildings covering a vast terrain, reflecting their rising power. New Temple was built between two of the most important thoroughfares in medieval London, Fleet Street to the north and the Thames to the south. It was located at the midpoint between the Tower of London and Westminster, two major locations for the kings of England. This was, and frankly is, the best real estate in London. Leaving the city and entering the Temple Church nearby is a trip back in time. The church is a symbol of medieval London. It was almost destroyed by German bombs during World War II. But fortunately, the numerous visual representations of the famous building allowed to rebuild it identically. Inside the nave, eight tombs of 13th century knights transport us back to a time when the Knights Templar and Jerusalem were powerful symbols. One of them, William Marshall, was considered the greatest knight in the world. He became a Templar before he died and asked to be buried in the shroud he had brought back from the Holy Land. In England, like in France and the rest of Latin Christianity, Jerusalem was considered the center of the world. Jerusalem was the top priority for all Christians at the time. Everything in the Temple Church evokes the importance of Jerusalem, and more specifically the city's most iconic monument, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Christians believe it contains the tomb of Christ. To the Templars, it was so essential that they used it as the basis for the architectural design for their church in London. To the medieval Christian mind, it simply was the most sacred place on earth. And by building this, you recreate the shape, and clearly, in some sense, you recreate the sanctity of the sepulchre. When the Templars built the Temple Church, the Crusaders in Jerusalem had just finished making an important addition to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The building now had the shape it has today, save from a few small modifications. The Templars in London based the design for their church on the original architecture of the famous building in Jerusalem. Like in Jerusalem, they built a round nave. The internal diameter was half the size of the church that inspired it. Like in Jerusalem, they erected large columns inside. And like in Jerusalem still, there was an ambulatory for pilgrims who wanted to walk all the way around it. While the influence of the Holy Sepulchre is omnipresent here, it's not the only one. Every element of the architecture of the Temple Church is full of religious symbolism. The perfect shape is the absolutely symmetrical circle. We are already, as it were, in a sight of the perfection of God's wisdom because God's wisdom has as its foundational shape the circle. The world was created, in Genesis, in six days. One, two, three, four, five, six columns. The day of the resurrection, Easter Day, is the first day of a new week. That is, it is day eight. Windows, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. There were 12 apostles, the colonnades on the walls. One, two, up to 12. There are these numbers, which to us mean not much. But I think certainly to some people in the Middle Ages would instantly, without a moment's reflection, have sparked a reflection. Yet in addition to religion, the architectural choices made by the Knights Templar were also intended to send a political message to the world. Visiting kings, nobles, dignitaries would be brought here. They were central to the military, political, diplomatic life of Europe. And this was as well as being a place of devotion, a place of enormous diplomatic importance. Many different details attest to the church's prestige. The refinement of the sculptured figures, some of which still have their original colors, the wide variety of capitals finishing the columns, and the use of Purbeck marble, a noble stone with a mysterious black finish. This is clearly a statement of power, of grandeur, and it's an expensive building. This abundance of means contrasted with the standards of the Templars' religious constructions. In London, Paris, and Tomar, the Templars built round churches. But those were special circumstances. They were large sites, places of power located in the heart of three Templar provinces. In most locations, the buildings were rectangular and had very simple shapes borrowed from local and regional traditions. This strategy of influence had a lasting effect. At the turn of the 13th century, the Knights Templar were at the peak of their power on the English stage, holding many key positions under the ruling king. This closeness led to the construction of another majestic part of the edifice, the choir. From the early 1230s to the early 1240s, this was the Knights Templar's largest undertaking on the English Temple since building the Rotunda. The choir was built because of King Henry III's decision in 1231 to be buried in the Temple, which inspired him to give the Church substantial funds to take on this extravagant project. While the architect made sure not to exceed the size of the Rotunda in height or width, so as not to overshadow its powerful symbolism, he nevertheless managed to deliver a building at the cutting edge of architectural techniques of the time. The most characteristic thing about such hall churches is that the side aisles are as high as the central aisle, so you can have these enormous windows on both sides flooding the whole building with light. And by this stage, the Gothic architect had really, really mastered his art. Unfortunately for the Templars, the King finally decided to be buried in Westminster Abbey, leaving the rest of the cost to the religious order. 800 years after it was built, the Church continues on as it did in the time of the Templars, or almost. Robin Griffith-Jones, the Temple Master, brings this unique Church back to life every day. To work in this place and to live in the Temple as well, it is to be daily moved by the simple beauty of this Church and by its significance. To imagine being in Jerusalem on a morning like this as the sun shines and the effigies lie here and the Church is quiet and beautiful. Yes, I do. You're right. I love it. The stones of the Temple Church, like those of all the Templar sites, carry within them the fate of these men who reigned over Europe for 200 years before completely disappearing. These deeply religious men and skilled builders, clever managers and political strategists left behind architecture as powerful as they once were.