Templar Globe

There are reckoned to be 400,000 monks in Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), about the same as the number of soldiers under the ruling junta’s command. The soldiers have the guns. The monks have the public’s support and, judging from the past fortnight’s protests, the courage and determination to defy the regime. But Myanmar’s tragic recent history suggests that when an immovable junta meets unstoppable protests, much blood is spilled.

In the last pro-democracy protests on this scale, in 1988, it took several rounds of massacres before the demonstrations finally subsided, leaving the regime as strong as ever. By Thursday September 27th, with a crackdown under way, and the first deaths from clashes with security forces, it seemed hard to imagine that things would be very different this time.

The latest round of protests began last month, after the government suddenly imposed drastic fuel-price rises. At first, the demonstrations were fairly small. It looked as if the protests might fizzle until soldiers fired over the heads of monks demonstrating in the central town of Pakkoku. The clergy demanded an apology, setting a deadline of September 17th. The next day, their demand having been ignored, they took to the streets.

At first, the regime’s forces stayed out of sight. On September 22nd, a group of monks and laymen was allowed to pray outside the normally heavily guarded home of Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) and icon of Myanmar’s struggle for democracy. Miss Suu Kyi’s public appearance—her first since she was detained four years ago—proved a boon to the demonstrators. On Monday the protest in Yangon, Myanmar’s main city, was said to be 100,000-strong.

That night the regime broke its silence. On state television and radio, it warned of unspecified action “according to the law” if protests continued. The next day the protesters defied the threat, staging a demonstration at least as big as Monday’s. Soon after that march ended, troops and riot police moved into positions around Yangon. On Wednesday the authorities announced a two-month night-time curfew and troops surrounded monasteries in the city. But swarms of protesters again poured on to the streets, defying tear-gas, warning shots and baton charges. The first deaths, including of monks, were reported. On Thursday, troops burst into monasteries around the country to make arrests but, again, this did not stop monks and laymen from hitting the streets, where riot police shot at them.

The regime may be trying to calibrate its response to the protests, using limited force at first to quell opponents. That said, it still has elite disciplined units which would be unlikely to flinch if ordered to open fire on unarmed monks and nuns. If there are any cracks in the junta’s unity, nobody outside knows about them.

Myanmar’s junta has survived in part through diplomatic triangulation. Like North Korea, it has borne isolation and rhetorical hostility from the West by cosying up to the neighbours, notably China. And it has tried to avoid total subservience to any one of these by playing them off against each other.

As in the past, the world’s initial response to the junta’s violence was marked by bickering and point-scoring. On September 27th, the United Nations Security Council met in response to pressure from the West for co-ordinated sanctions. But Russia and China argued that the unrest was an internal matter that should not be on the council’s agenda at all. America announced new sanctions against the regime, in keeping with a policy some Western countries have pursued for nearly two decades. They are cheered on by a vocal and well-organised exile movement, and, when she was able to make her views known, by Miss Suu Kyi herself. Her heroic stature has helped make Myanmar a fashionable cause.

Shareholder-activists and ordinary consumers in the West have also done their bit to encourage a boycott. But isolation has never really been on the cards. Any gap is eagerly filled by Myanmar’s neighbours—not just China, but also India and Thailand and other members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN). American leaders have insisted the junta honour the 1990 election result, won by Miss Suu Kyi’s NLD, and step aside. To this end, they have already imposed wide-ranging sanctions. The European Union has been more equivocal, and its sanctions correspondingly milder. Japan, Burma’s biggest aid donor until 1988, has been softer still.

If any countries can sway the junta they are the regional ones: ASEAN, especially Thailand; India; and above all China. China has given the junta diplomatic support, helping for years to keep its behaviour off the agenda of the United Nations Security Council. But Myanmar is far from a client state. This week Chinese spokesmen called for restraint in responding to the protests. Their pleas seem to be falling on deaf ears.

Even if pressure both from within and beyond Myanmar’s borders causes the regime to crumble, the country’s troubles would still be daunting. Many of the ethnic minorities continue to distrust the majority “Burmans”, even including the democrats. And the NLD has been gutted by years of oppression. Miss Suu Kyi, inspiring figure though she is, is an untested leader who has perforce been woefully out of touch with events.

As in 1988 and 1990 the Burmese people have shown they want to choose their own leaders. In the past they did not fully reckon on the ruthlessness of the people they were up against. One day, as with all tyrannies, Myanmar’s will fall. But much blood may flow before that day dawns.

in The Economist

The Devil’s Bible, the world’s biggest manuscript now on display in Prague, has an eventful 800-year-long history, accompanied by legends highlighting its emergence and alleged miraculous powers, and it is also unique as a book that only few Czech experts have ever been able to look at.

The illuminated Devil’s Bible (Codex Gigas) is of Czech origin but it has been kept by Swedes since the 17th-century.

“For the last time it was enquired into by [Czech early 19th century priest and scientist] Josef Dobrovsky, who actually re-discovered it in Sweden,” Czech National Library expert Miroslava Hejnova, who assisted at the rare book’s transport to Prague, has told CTK.

The Swedes took the Devil’s Bible away from Bohemia as part of their war loot at the end of the Thirty Years’ War. The first one to try to buy it out was Antonin Jan Nostic, the Austrian Empire’s ambassador to Sweden, in 1685-90. He gained back 133 sheets.

Dobrovsky visited Sweden in 1792 to examine the local works of Bohemian origin. He uncovered the Devil’s Bible and other Czech manuscripts in the Royal Library in Stockholm.

Another two Czech researchers examined the Devil’s Bible in Stockholm in the mid-19th century.

The Devil’s Bible comprises 14 texts. Apart from the Old Testament it is also the Penitential - a manual for priests featuring the list of sins and ways of penance.

Elsewhere the manuscript offers formulas to do away with diseases or to uncover and catch a thief.

The text copying the early 12th century Kosmas chronicle is widely viewed as the most valuable.

All texts in the Devil’s Bible are well readable. All were probably written by a single person, who must have worked on them for up to 20 years.

The monumental book’s value is beyond any speculations as its putting on sale is unthinkable. It can be only compared with other rare medieval manuscripts in the Czech Republic, which, nevertheless, are smaller, less illuminated and less popular.

Their value is estimated at tens and hundreds of millions of crowns. The most valuable of them is probably the Vysehrad Code, the late 11th century manuscript whose value is estimated at up to one billion crowns, experts say.

in The Prague Daily Monitor

Jesus has been in the news a lot lately, from the controversy over the Gnostic Gospels and The Passion of the Christ, to the books Holy Blood, Holy Grail and The Da Vinci Code and now with the documentary, The Lost Tomb of Jesus on the Discovery Channel, Jesus has surpassed Britney Spears in the number of results in a Google News search. Although I am not a churchgoer and have never felt comfortable or understood the costumes, ceremonies and rituals involved in church worship, I’ve always felt secure with the knowledge of a higher power and I sense rhyme and reason with the workings of the natural world that are too orchestrated to be mere happenstance.

I have always resonated with Jesus, a man who walked his own path, was kind, wise and considered his connection with God above all else, but I also felt a disconnect with how he was portrayed by mainstream Christianity. But when I discovered the Gospel of Thomas, it opened doors in my perception of the man whose existence changed time. The Gospel of Thomas (link) was discovered, along with other Gnostic text, around 1946 in a three-foot tall clay urn in a cave near Nag Hammadi, Egypt.

The Gnostics were named after the term “Gnosis”, a Greek word for knowledge and the Gnostic Christians believed that the connection with God could be found through their own intuition and experience, instead of following the traditional roles of the church. The Gnostic gospels include the Gospel of Thomas, Phillip and Mary Magdalene, among others, and although these disciples walked with Jesus, their words were not included in the Bible. Some even believe that the Gospel of John, is a direct rebuttle to Thomas’ gospel.

Although many of the sayings in the Gospel of Thomas are reflected in the other gospels included in the Bible, especially Matthew, most are new to us, but the church still considers the Gnostic gospels to be heresy. There is a lot of confusion as to when the text were written, some claim as early as 50 CE and others claim as late as 400 CE. It is said that when Constantine accepted Christainity he ordered that the Gnostic text should be burned and the monks, fearing the loss of valuable information, buried them in a cave overlooking the monastery. Some scholars claim that the Thomas gospel, which consists only of 114 sayings attributed to Jesus, is not a true gospel because it does not give a historial perspective and does not focus on the crucifixion and resurrection, but others believe it is the most valuable find of our time.

I’ve pondered the Second Coming of Jesus, wondering how it may occur, I know the church tells us of trumpets and glory, but when I look back on history and see how it reflects the last time Jesus came to call, it concerns me. I’ve often wondered if he came back, would history repeat, as it so often does and he would be crucified again. Are we any more in tune with our God connection now, as opposed to 2000 years ago? Or would his return be more subtle? And I don’t understand why church leaders and Biblical scholars react so strongly when new information about Jesus is unearthed, shouldn’t we be open to new ideas, to seek, as Jesus instructed. In his own words, “Let him who seeks continue seeking until he finds. When he finds, he will become troubled. When he becomes troubled, he will be astonished, and he will rule over the All.” (Thomas #2)

And I’ve often thought, what if the Second Coming is different from what we have been taught to expect? Could the movies, books and documentaries questioning history and putting Jesus’ name in the news, again and again in recent years, be the subtle way he is attempting to reach us? Have we been misdirected? I don’t have the answers, but perhaps Jesus did, “The pharisees and the scribes have taken the keys of knowledge (gnosis) and hidden them. They themselves have not entered, nor have they allowed to enter those who wish to. You, however, be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves.” (Thomas #39)

by Victoria Hardy

The selection of the Reverend Joseph Li Shan, who is to be installed as the Roman Catholic bishop of Beijing on Friday, was no surprise to those who closely follow religious affairs in China. Li, 42, who rose steadily through a Chinese Catholic clergy that was far reduced by the Cultural Revolution and was slowly rebuilt as the Chinese government relaxed its attitudes toward officially recognized organized religions, has been in the wings for some time.

Less certain has been the question of how Beijing and the Vatican, whose relations have suffered numerous ups and downs, would come to terms over an appointment that for both parties involves difficulties in ceding authority and large amounts of face.

Whether in Beijing or in Rome, no observers are describing Li’s elevation as a fundamental breakthrough in relations, but many voices could be heard saying that the discreet way the appointment has been handled and, above all, the avoidance of any open dispute bodes well for future relations.

“This is good news and it will pave the way for more interaction between the two sides in the future,” said Yan Kejia, a researcher at the Religion Institute of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. “The Vatican’s attitude toward Li Shan’s appointment shows that the door is open, even if relations have not been normalized.”

He was echoed by the Reverend Bernardo Cevellera, editor of Asia News, a publication that covers religious matters and maintains close ties to the Vatican.

“This is a very good sign of starting a dialogue,” he agreed.

The appointment of Li, who was the head of Beijing’s East Church and is a graduate of the Beijing Catholic Seminary, was the result of a delicate back and forth between China and the Vatican whose details neither side is eager to publicize or acknowledge.

According to several observers, this has meant the Vatican’s signaling the identities of a number of Chinese Catholics with whom it is comfortable and Beijing’s choosing a bishop from among them. A variation on this process might have involved Beijing’s producing a list of candidates with the Vatican subsequently signaling its approval. Officials on neither side will say.

As recently as June 30, in a letter to the Chinese authorities, Pope Benedict XVI said the Vatican “would desire to be completely free to appoint bishops.”

In recent weeks, though, the Vatican has quietly signaled that this ordination has its approval and it has notably not spoken out against it, as has been the case in past ordinations without the pope’s consent.

Liu Bainian, the deputy chairman of the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, a government-affiliated group that oversees the Chinese Catholic Church, declined to confirm the back and forth. “The Vatican has agreed with the results of our election of bishops before, and we thought those were moves in a good direction. How they see Li Shan is their business, but it is our hope they continue walking a good direction.”

That such machinations are required is a reflection of a long history of suspicion toward foreign religious authority in China, fueled in part by what most Chinese see as their country’s humiliating subjugation by Western powers during the last two centuries.

Since the Communist revolution in 1949, the state has maintained strict control over all rights of association, meaning that every group must organize under the aegis of the Communist Party. Restrictions like this have been used to maintain tight control over all religious activities in China.

The Chinese state, in effect, runs all above-ground churches in China, as well as Buddhist temples, mosques and other recognized places of worship. China has also maintained tight control over clerical appointments. Beijing’s new bishop, Li, for example, is a representative in the Beijing People’s Congress, or local assembly, undoubtedly bolstering his credentials in the government’s eyes.

At its heart, the difficulty over nominations like Li’s lies with the fact that historically, both parties, the Vatican and Beijing, claim this authority. But as the two sides have positioned themselves around this issue, other interests have also come into play.

As Chinese society has gradually liberalized, many among China’s officially estimated five million Catholics - as well as perhaps seven million underground Catholics by some estimates - have yearned for normalized relations with the Vatican and with Roman Catholics everywhere.

The Chinese government, for its part, would like to see Rome, which recognizes Taiwan, drop its relations with what Beijing sees as a renegade province. The Vatican, meanwhile, would like to promote greater religious freedom in China, easing, among other things, tight limits on religious education.

For Beijing, hovering in the background, beyond its relations with the Vatican, are relations with other religions, both officially recognized and not. China’s Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists and others could be expected to seek whatever expanded freedoms or autonomy will be enjoyed by Catholics.

“China has openly said that it does not have a timetable to build diplomatic ties with the Vatican, but it has also said that such ties are not impossible,” said Kung Lap Yan, an associate professor of cultural and religious studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. “China needs the Vatican to leverage Taiwan, to isolate it by establishing relations.

“But it also wary of getting too close to the Vatican, which would give the Vatican more power and influence over China.”

Howard W. French reported from Shanghai, Ian Fisher from Rome.

in International Herald Tribune

A la tercera Ayman al Zawahiri se explayó. El número dos de Al Qaeda hizo ayer un llamamiento a “limpiar el Magreb musulmán de los hijos de Francia y España”. Sus palabras tendrán, probablemente, un efecto movilizador sobre una franja minoritaria de la juventud magrebí. Fue la tercera vez, desde diciembre pasado, que el lugarteniente de Osama Bin Laden señaló a España y a sus vecinos del sur, pero hasta ahora nunca les había dedicado tanto tiempo. El vídeo, subtitulado en inglés, fue colgado ayer en la página web de As Sahab, la productora del grupo terrorista. Difundido con motivo del sexto aniversario de los atentados del 11-S, abarca, a lo largo de sus 80 minutos de duración, otros muchos temas y ataca con dureza al régimen de Pakistán.

Al Zawahiri fija un objetivo a los magrebíes: “La recuperación de Al Andalus es un deber para la oumma [comunidad musulmana] y para cada uno [de los muyahidín] en particular”. Al Andalus es el nombre que los musulmanes dan a la península Ibérica a partir de 711, cuando estuvo regentada por califas y emires, hasta su expulsión en 1492.

La reconquista de Al Andalus es una reivindicación frecuente en boca de los responsables de Al Qaeda. El propio Al Zawahiri comparó, en julio, la “ocupación” española de esa tierra musulmana con la de Irak por Estados Unidos.

Para recuperar Al Andalus hay que dar un paso previo: “Sólo podréis hacerlo eliminando del Magreb islámico a los hijos de Francia y España que han regresado”, recalca el brazo derecho de Bin Laden.

“No se equivoquen, al mencionar a los hijos alude ante todo a los regímenes del Magreb que considera lacayos de las antiguas potencias coloniales”, asegura Abdalá Rami, analista del Centro de Estudios en Ciencias Sociales de Casablanca.

Cuando se refieren al Gobierno de Argel, los salafistas argelinos -en enero cambiaron su nombre por el de Al Qaeda en el Magreb Islámico- lo tachan siempre de “siervo” o “lacayo” de Francia.

“La amenaza de Al Zawahiri apunta hacia los regímenes, pero también está dirigida contra los ciudadanos e intereses de España y Francia en la zona y, en última instancia, contra Ceuta y Melilla”, sostiene Fernando Reinares, director del programa de terrorismo global del Real Instituto Elcano.

Esta vez, sin embargo, el médico egipcio que secunda a Bin Laden no mencionó a las dos ciudades autónomas. Sí lo hizo, en cambio, en diciembre pasado. Arremetió contra la “ocupación” española, que equiparó con la que Rusia ejerce sobre Chechenia. Abdelmalek Droukdal, el líder de los salafistas argelinos, instó en mayo a Marruecos a “limpiar” ambas ciudades de “las impurezas españolas”.

Al Zawahiri ensalzó, a continuación, la lucha de los “padres y abuelos” de los magrebíes que “derramaron su sangre” para expulsar a las potencias coloniales. Invitó así a los jóvenes magrebíes a seguir el ejemplo de sus antepasados.

Los islamistas siempre mostraron cierto desprecio por la lucha del Frente de Liberación Nacional argelino, apenas teñida de religiosidad, pero consideran que el rifeño Abdelkrim, que se sublevó contra España, fue uno de sus precursores.

“Sed fieles a vuestra religión, a la sunna [palabras] de vuestro profeta y a la sangre de vuestros antepasados”, concluye Al Zawahiri su capítulo audiovisual sobre el Magreb. “Apoyad a vuestros hijos, los muyahidín, en su lucha contra los cruzados y sus hijos”.

El hombre a apoyar en el Magreb aparece también en imágenes de archivo incluidas en el vídeo. Es el argelino Abdelmalek Droukdal, jefe de la rama magrebí de Al Qaeda, responsable de los numerosos atentados que han ensangrentado Argelia. Desde principios de año, la violencia terrorista se ha cobrado casi 400 muertos en el país.

“Es un discurso dirigido a los magrebíes y por eso menciona a Francia”, prosigue Abdalá Rami. “En algunas franjas de la población del Magreb, Francia, a causa de su pasado colonial, tiene una imagen más negativa que Estados Unidos”.

“No es el caso de España, a la que Al Zawahiri asocia esta vez con Francia”, señala el investigador marroquí. “Sólo algunos marroquíes denostan también a España por su colonización de la franja norte y por su presencia en Ceuta y Melilla”.

El lugarteniente de Bin Laden es “el estratega de Al Qaeda”, afirma Reinares. Ayer “señaló al Magreb como zona de conflicto y lo marcó como territorio prioritario”. “Está dando ordenes no sólo a los salafistas argelinos, sino a otros grupos asociados e incluso a individuos aislados” que sueñan con apuntarse a la yihad.

“Anticipa lo que no tardaremos mucho en ver, dentro de semanas o meses”, concluye el investigador del Real Instituto Elcano. Los servicios de seguridad “no lograrán abortar todos los intentos de perpetrar atentados”. “Algunos saldrán adelante y estarán dirigidos contra intereses o ciudadanos franceses o españoles”.

Las fuerzas de seguridad del Magreb temen especialmente el regreso de decenas o cientos de jóvenes que viajaron a Irak y que, si no murieron combatiendo, han adquirido una experiencia que sueñan con poner en práctica en sus países de origen.

in El País

Hey, we just hit the 50,000 hits mark!

We have to thank our readers for this huge success. The Templar Globe has been experiencing an amazing increase in the number of daily visitors in the last few months. Our statistics show that we have been almost doubling traffic month on month and that the major part is returning readers. While it took 8 months to reach the 10,000 visits benchmark, it took only another 6 to multiply the visits five times over. It’s an amazing growth and a great incentive to keep bringing you news from the Order and other Templar related issues.

Please, help us commemorate the occasion by inviting one friend to visit us. If everyone does it, we shall double these numbers quickly. And do tell us what kind of posts you would like to read in the future from our writers. We will do whatever we can to indulge you. After all, you were the one who took us this far!

Thank you!
_________________________________
Hey, acabamos de llegar a las 50,000 visitas!

Debemos dar las gracias a nuestros lectores por este éxito tremendo. El Templar Globe ha experimentado un grande aumento de visitas diarias en los últimos meses. Nuestras estadísticas muestran que hemos casi doblado de mes a mes y que la mayor parte es de lectores que vuelven. Mientras tardó 8 meses a llegar a las 10,000 visitas, solo han tardado otros 6 meses a multiplicar las visitas por cinco. Es un crecimiento increíble y un gran incentivo para seguir trayendo noticias de la Orden y otros temas Templários.

Por favor, ayude-nos a conmemorar la ocasión invitando un amigo a visitarnos. Se todos lo hicieren, doblaremos estos números rápidamente. Y no se olvide de comentar-nos que tipo de posts le gustaría ver aquí. Haremos el posible para complacerlos. Al final, vosotros han sido os que nos han hecho llegar aquí!

Gracias!
______________________________________

Hey, acabámos de chegar aos 50,000 hits!

Devemos agradecer aos nossos leitores por este êxito inesperado. O Templar Globe tem experimentado um aumento incrível no número de visitantes diários nos últimos meses. As nossas estatísticas mostram que quase dobrámos o tráfego de mês para mês e que a maior parte é de leitores que regressam. Enquanto passaram 8 meses até que tivessemos 10,000 visitantes, em apenas mais 6 multiplicámos as visitas por cinco. É um crescimento incrível e um enorme incentivo para continuar a trazer-vos notícias da Ordem e outros assuntos de interesse para os Templários.

Por favor, ajudem-nos a comemorar a ocasião convidando um amigo a visitar as nossas páginas. Se cada um o fizer, dobraremos estes números rapidamente. E não se esqueçam de nos dizer que tipo de posts gostariam de ler no futuro. Faremos os possíveis para estar à altura. Afinal, foram vocês que nos trouxeram até aqui!

Muito obrigado!

Dear readers,

As you may have noticed, I haven’t been able to update our pages since Saturday. That was due to a server error that prevented me to log in. This week I’m off to Madrid to preside over the Magisterial Council meeting and General Assembly of Priors of the Order. This is the most important meeting of the Order’s calendar along the year and in it members from all parts of the world come together to discuss our problems, decide on several subjects, debate topics of interest to Templars worldwide and learn a bit more with our conferences, studies and papers. So I think I shall take the opportunity to make a short break from my duties here at the Templar Globe while I prepare this extremely important upcoming meeting.

I will be back to these pages Monday, September 24th. It’s the first (much needed) break this year. I will bring you all the news from the Order as soon as I get back. Meanwhile, be sure to check older posts and our new Blogroll section. You’ll find many interesting links there.

See you next Monday,

Interesting YouTube clip from the History Channel about the Temple in Jerusalem

Dans les premiers jours d’octobre 1307, ayant sans doute eu vent de quelque chose, le maître du Temple en France, Gérard de Villiers, s’enfuit de Paris avec une quarantaine de frères, et l’on ne sait pas ce qu’il lui advint. Il n’en fallut pas plus pour donner naissance à un racontar selon lequel ce personnage et son groupe auraient convoyé trois chariots - pourquoi trois ? - transportant « le » trésor de l’Ordre, bien entendu d’une valeur inestimable, qu’ils auraient enfoui au coeur de la forêt d’Orient, près de Troyes, ou enseveli dans une cave rémoise (1).

A moins que ces coffres regorgeant de métal précieux ne soient cachés au Luxembourg, à Gisors dans le Vexin, en Bretagne ou au Portugal, pour ne rien dire de Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises… Qu’un trésor du Temple n’ait jamais existé sous cette forme - puisque les agents de Philippe le Bel prirent possession des fonds déposés au Temple de Paris et les transmirent à l’Hôpital - permettra de le chercher longtemps encore…

Le seul trésor templier dont les archives ont livré la trace, précise Alain Demurger, est celui rassemblé par l’ancien visiteur de France, Hugues de Pairaud, qui le remit au commandeur de Dormelles, près de Moret-sur-Loing, Pierre Gaudes. Ce dernier, inquiet du sort à venir des Templiers, confia le 22 septembre 1307 ce « petit coffre » à un pêcheur, qui le cacha sous son lit. Là, il fut trouvé et remis à l’autorité royale. Il contenait 1 189 monnaies d’or et 5 010 d’argent, soit une vingtaine de kilos.

Pour le reste, les maisons templières ne livrent pas davantage de trouvailles que d’autres établissements d’exploitation seigneuriale.

L. T.

1. « Histoires mystérieuses des trésors enfouis », de Didier Audinot (Grancher).

The orders of any historical existence may be reduced to three categories: (a) The Greater Regular Orders; (b) The Lesser Regular Orders; (c) The Secular Orders.

The Greater Regular Orders
The great military orders had their origin in the crusades, from which they retain the common badge of every order of knighthood — the cross worn on the breast.

Military Orders

The oldest of these, the Knights Templars, has served as a model for all the others. After barely a century of existence, they were suppressed by Clement V; but two remnants remained after the fourteenth century, the Order of Christ in Portugal, and the Order of Montesa in Spain. In the twelfth century Portugal had borrowed their rule from the Templars and founded the Portuguese Order of Aviz. Almost at the same time there arose in Castile the Order of Calatrava and in Leon the Order of Alcantara.

Military/Hospitaller Orders

Contemporary with these purely military orders, others were founded at once military and hospitaller, the most famous of which were the Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem (Knights of Malta) and the Teutonic Knights (modelled on the former), both still in existence. In the same category should be included the Order of Santiago which spread throughout Castile, Leon, and Portugal.

Hospitaller Orders

Lastly, there are the purely hospitaller orders whose commanders, however, claimed the rank of knights though they had never been in battle, such as the Orders of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem and of the Holy Spirit of Montpellier. With these may be connected the Order of Our Lady of Ransom (Nuestra Señora de Merced, also called Mercedarians), founded (121 in Aragon by St. Peter Nolasco for the redemption of captives. Including religious knights as well as religious clerics, it was originally considered a military order, but dissensions arose and each rank chose its own grand master. John XXII (1317) reserved the grand-mastership to clerics, with the result of a general exodus of knights into the newly founded military Order of Montesa.

Cross of Saint Lazarus

The Lesser Regular Orders
There is mention in the twelfth century, in Castile, of an Order of Montjoie, confirmed by Alexander III (1180), but difficult to distinguish from the Order of Calatrava, with which it was soon amalgamated.

In 1191, after the siege of Acre, Richard I of England founded there in fulfilment of a vow, the Order of St. Thomas of Canterbury, an order of hospitallers for the service of English pilgrims. It seems to have been made dependent on the Hospitallers of St. John, whom it followed to Cyprus after the evacuation of Palestine. Its existence is attested by the Bullarium of Alexander IV and John XXII; beyond this it has left but little trace except a church of remarkable architecture, St. Nicholas, at Nicosia in Cyprus.

Better known is the history of the Schwertzbrüder (Ensiferi, or Swordbearers) of Livonia, founded by Albert, first Bishop of Riga (1197), to propagate the Faith in the Baltic Provinces and to protect the new Christianity there against the pagan nations still numerous in that part of Europe. Against these pagans a crusade had been preached; but, the temporary crusaders having made haste to withdraw, it became necessary, as in Palestine, to supply their place with a permanent order. This order adopted the statutes, the white mantle and the red cross of the Templars, with a red sword as their distinctive badge, whence their name of Ensiferi. The order was approved in 1202 by a Bull of Innocent III. Thrown open to all sorts of persons without distinction of birth, overrun by aimless adventurers whose excesses were calculated rather to exasperate the pagans than to convert them, it endured but a short time, having only two grand masters, the first of whom, Vinnon, was murdered by one of his fellows in 1209, while the second, Volquin, fell on the field of battle in 1236, with four hundred and eighty knights of the order. The survivors petitioned to be allowed to enter the Teutonic Order, of which the Knights of Livonia thenceforward formed one branch under a provincial master of their own (1238). Their possessions, acquired by conquest, formed a principality under Charles V (1525), and the last of their masters, Gottart Kettler, apostatized and converted it into the hereditary Duchy of Courland under the suzerainty of the kings of Poland (1562).

The Gaudenti of Our Lady at Bologna, confirmed by Urban IV in 1262, and suppressed by Sixtus V in 1589, were not so much a military order as an association of gentlemen who undertook to maintain the public peace in those turbulent times.

An order of St. George of Alfama, in Aragon, approved in 1363 by Urban V, was merged in the Order of Montesa in 1399.

The Knights of St. George, in Austria, founded by the Emperor Frederick III, and approved by Paul II in 1468, failing to perpetuate their existence, owing to the lack of territorial possessions, gave place to a purely secular confraternity.

The Order of St. Stephen Pope was founded in Tuscany by the Grand Duke Cosimo I and approved in 1561 by Pius IV, being placed under the Benedictine Rule. It had its principal house at Pisa, and was obliged to equip a certain number of galleys to fight the Turks in the Mediterranean after the manner of, and in concert with, the “caravans” of the Knights of Malta.

Order of the Garter, England

The Secular Orders
Dating from the fourteenth century, fraternities of lay knights were formed modelled on the great regular orders; as in the latter, we find in these secular orders a patron, a vow to serve the Church and the sovereign, statutes, a grand master (usually the reigning prince), and the practice of certain devotions. Most of them also asked for the approbation of the Holy See, which, on the other hand, granted them spiritual favours — indulgences, the privilege of private oratories, dispensation from certain fasts, etc.

The chief of these orders are as follows:

England

In England, Edward III, in memory of the legendary Knights of the Round Table, established in 1349 brotherhood of twenty-five knights, exclusive of princes of the blood and foreign princes, with St. George as its patron and with its chapel in Windsor Castle for the holding of chapters. This, the Order of the Garter, takes its name from the characteristic badge, won on the left knee. The choice of this badge has given rise to various anecdotes of doubtful authenticity. Nothing is now known of the original object of the Order of the Bath, the creation of which dates from the coronation of Henry IV (1399). A third order, Scottish by origin, is that of the Order of the Thistle, dating from the reign of James V of Scotland (1534). These orders still exist, though they have been protestantized.

France

In France, the royal orders of the Star, dating from John the Good (1352), of St. Michael, founded by Louis XI (1469), of the Holy Ghost, founded by Henry III (1570), of Our Lady of Carmel, amalgamated by Henry IV with that of St. Lazarus were absolutely suppressed by the Revolution.

Austria and Spain

Austria and Spain now dispute the inheritance from the House of Burgundy of the right to confer the Order of the Golden Fleece, founded by Duke Philip the Good, approved by Eugene IV in 1433, and extended by Leo X in 1516.

Piedmont

In Piedmont, the Order of the Annunziata, under its later form, dates only from Charles III, Duke of Savoy, in 1518, but its first dedication to the Blessed Virgin goes back to Amadeus VIII, first Duke of Savoy, antipope under the name of Felix V (1434). There had, previously to this dedication, existed in Savoy an Order of the Collar, which held its chapters in the Charterhouse (founded in 1892) of Pierre-Châtel in Bugey. Here also the Knights of the Annunziata kept their feast of the Annunciation, so that they have considered themselves as successors of the Order of the Collar. After the cession of Bugey to France, they transferred their chapters to the newly founded Camaldolese monastery on the Mountain of Turin (1627).

Mantua

In the Duchy of Mantua, Duke Vincent Gonzaga, on the marriage of his son Francis II, instituted, with the approbation of Paul V, the Knights of the Precious Blood, a relic of which is venerated in that capital.

Pontifical Secular Orders

Lastly there are a number of pontifical secular orders, the oldest of which is the Order of Christ, contemporary with the institution of the same order in Portugal in 1319. In approving the latter institution, John XXII reserved the right of creating a certain number of knights by patent, and it is now used to reward services rendered by any person whatsoever without distinction of birth.

The same is to be said of the Order of St. Peter, instituted by Leo X in 1520, of the Order of St. Paul, founded by Paul III in 1534, and of Our Lady of Loretto, charged by Sixtus V in 1558, to watch over and preserve that sanctuary. These distinctions were mostly granted to functionaries of the pontifical chancery.

There has been some question as to the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, formerly dependent on the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and reorganized by Pope Pius X. The Knights of St. Catherine of Sinai are not an order, either secular or regular.

in Catholic Encyclopedia, by CH Moeller

Santiago de Compostela has been a lodestar for visitors for more than a thousand years. The world’s first guidebook was written in 1130 by Aimeri Picaud, a French monk, to give information to travelers on their way there. In the early Middle Ages, between 500,000 and 2 million people came each year. They came, however, not for the sun or the architecture, but to visit the sacred relics of the body of St. James.

As a center of Christian pilgrimage, Santiago rivaled Rome and the Holy Land. The Camino de Santiago, or the Way of St. James, originated in towns all over Europe - in England, Germany, Italy, Scandinavia and, of course, France. Pilgrims set out alone, in small groups, or in large gatherings. For the most part, their paths converged in France, where the routes were organized by the Benedictines and Cistercians of Cluny and Citeaux and the Knights Templars of the Spanish Order of the Red Sword. By the time the pilgrims crossed the Pyrenees and entered Spain, they continued on two routes only - the northern coastal road, called the Asturian, and the more popular Camino Frances, or French Way. Along the latter, so much traveled over hundreds of years, and still used today, were built some of the most spiritual and magnificent of Spanish buildings. Yet nothing prepares one for the wonder of Santiago de Compostela itself.

In Spain it is often impossible to separate tradition and history. But there’s no doubt that a visit to this northwest corner of the Iberian Peninsula is made far more exciting by some knowledge of the extraordinary events that did (or didn’t) happen there. St. James the Apostle, brother of St. John the Evangelist, brought Christianity to Spain and then returned to the Holy Land, where he was beheaded; his body was conveyed to Spain by his disciples in a rudderless boat that found its way to a little inland port now known as Padron.

About 15 miles southeast of Santiago, Padron is a good introduction to the marvelous mysteries. If you’re lucky enough to find the priest to let you in, enter the little 17th-century parish church of Santiago by the River Sar, which flows through the town; under the altar you can actually see the granite stone to which the apostle’s boat was tied. Thus the name Padron, taken from ”piedra,” meaning stone.

After St. James’s body reached Spain, it disappeared for 800 years until Pelayo, a hermit, saw a brilliant star flashing over a woodland (hence, perhaps, Compostela, from ”campo de la estrella,” or ”field of the star”). An ancient burial place was unearthed and on July 25, A.D. 813, the holy remains were drawn triumphantly in an ox cart into the center of Santiago. On the busy Calle de Franco, there’s a little shrine to mark the spot where the journey ended, and near the city walls, by the fine stone market, there stands the Romanesque church of San Felix de Solovia, built near the cave in which the hermit Pelayo lived; the church is notable for a 12th-century tympanum of the Adoration of the Magi.

On the top of the Bishop’s Palace, facing the great Cathedral of St. James, there is a huge statue of a knight on horseback carrying a banner. Not much, you might think, to do with the James who watched with his brother at Gethsemane. But this is his reincarnation, Santiago Matamoros, the Moorslayer, who appeared miraculously to inspire the Christians in their battles against the infidels. His banner bore an ornamental red cross and it is still the city’s symbol, marking souvenir ashtrays, key chains and decals.

A third St. James was created by the pilgrims themselves. He is dressed as one of them, with a wide-brimmed hat and a heavy cloak adorned with the scallop shell that was - and remains - the pilgrims’ emblem. He carries a stout staff with a drinking gourd attached. This St. James appears above the Holy Door in the cathedral’s east facade, overlooking the Plaza de la Quintana.

The pilgrims usually entered the cathedral by the Puerta de Azabacheria, where the jet workers made and sold their wares. Jet and silver are still the two crafts of Santiago, and the silvermakers cluster round their own door, the Platerias, with its superbly carved Romanesque entrance and 17th-century clock tower.

There is an argument for never leaving the cathedral and the four great squares that surround it. The extraordinary many-layered building embraces, in its crypt, an 11th-century barrel-vaulted church; its gigantic Gothic cloister has a dazzling filigree trellis, and its Treasury Tower recalls a Thai temple.

The 18th-century Baroque Obradoiro (west) facade, with its double staircase, is the most ornate. Within is an older facade, decorated with a parade of stone figures carved by Master Mateo in the 12th century: the Door of Glory. The master carved a self-portrait on the back of the pillar on which St. James and, above him, Christ in Glory look out into the narthex. Here, St. James and, indeed, all the more than 200 figures, particularly the mysteriously smiling Daniel, have a warmth and gentleness that belie their granite material.

Inside, at the heart of the cathedral, yet another St. James, resplendent in golden cloak studded with jewels, dominates the center aisle from above the main altar. Steps leading upward allow pilgrims to walk behind the statue, kiss its mantle and embrace its shoulders. Steps leading downward uncover a small shrine where an ornate silver chest contains the bones of the saint.

Hidden from the buccaneering Sir Francis Drake in 1589, these relics were lost again for three centuries until a historian, Antonio Lopez Ferreiro, found them in 1879. An elaborate plaque commemorating him can be seen opposite the old university buildings now housing the geography and history faculties.

The quest for St. James leads into every corner of the city; the problem is to unravel fact from fiction. Indisputably real, because it stands four-square at the northwest corner of the cathedral in the Plaza de Espana, is the Hostal de los Reyes Catolicos, built by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand at the turn of the 16th century to house and nurse the pilgrims who were pouring into the city. Forgetting for a moment Isabella’s terrible legacy of the Inquisition, her hotel/hospital is a tranquil and glorious monument to religious belief. It is built round four courtyards and displays the most beautiful hotel doorway in the world, ornamented with a profusion of carved figures, beginning with Adam and Eve. Since 1954, the Hostal has been run as part of the Spanish national chain of paradors. Yet it is still a charitable foundation: each day, up to 10 certified pilgrims can claim three free meals a day for up to three days. These contemporary pilgrims eat with the staff, the manager explains.

It is perfectly possible to visit Santiago and see it only as another splendid European city. Its Plaza de Espana rivals in magnificence the shell-shaped Piazza del Campo in Siena or the Piazza San Marco in Venice. The stone-paved streets have a multitude of cafes and bars that, in term time, are thronged with some of the 47,000 students who fill the thriving University of Santiago. Yet among the tourists you will spot the pilgrims: one morning two white-haired men with backpacks entered through Mateo’s Door of Glory and pressed their fingers into the holes made in the stone by their forerunners over eight centuries.

Inside the offices of the cathedral sits a representative of the secretariat whose one job is to certify the true pilgrims, those who have walked, bicycled or ridden (on horseback) over at least 50 kilometers (about 30 miles) to get to Santiago. They bring a card stamped in the town halls along the route and sign in at a registry. Under the heading ”motives for pilgrimage,” someone has written ”une promesse” and someone else ”100 percent por Dios” and a third ”religieux et sportifs.” A very ‘’sportif” Frenchman bounds in while I am there; he has bicycled from the Rue St. Jacques in Paris, the traditional start of the route, to Santiago in 10 days. The secretary tells me that the number of pilgrims has more than doubled in the past 10 years.

(more…)

The final resting place of the Holy Grail is shrouded in mystery - or is it? Adam Edwards visits a remarkable mansion for sale in Wales, where many believe the sacred relic once resided. Was it the real thing? And is it now in a bank vault in Herefordshire?

The search for the Holy Grail has never ceased. This legendary, sacred vessel, from which Christ is thought to have drunk at the Last Supper, is the most important relic in Christendom, and has not been found. Or has it?

It is a story that has fascinated generations of Englishmen, from Malory to Monty Python. Many scholars believe that the bowl passed into the possession of Joseph of Arimathea, after he used it to gather the blood of Christ following the Crucifixion. Later, Joseph reputedly brought the olive-wood cup from the Holy Land to Glastonbury, in Somerset, where he founded an abbey in the first century.

And yet the final resting place of the Holy Grail remains shrouded in mystery. The Knights Templar were rumoured to have acquired it. Others believe it was taken to Nova Scotia in 1398. Many others, including a generation of hippies, think Joseph hid it either in the Chalice Well in Glastonbury or beneath the Tor.

And then there are those who are convinced it is lodged in a much less romantic resting place - the vault of a branch of Lloyds TSB bank somewhere in Herefordshire, taken there for safe-keeping from its last home - a grand, if fly-blown, house in west Wales.

It is a long and winding road to Nanteos Mansion. One must cross the Black Mountains and the Cambrian Mountains and negotiate the Devil Bridge Gorges before dropping down into the soft, remote countryside of lowland Ceredigion (Cardiganshire).

And then it is easy to miss the dowdy and discoloured hotel sign and to overshoot the hidden turning. Only after half a mile, when the narrow lane merges into an overgrown drive that hugs the hillside, does one finally arrive at the gravel apron outside the front door. Nanteos Mansion is, as far as anyone knows, the only Grade-I listed, 18th-century Palladian mansion that is a starless bed & breakfast.

Sadly, it has been allowed to degenerate into a run-down crash pad that is used for a few, down-at-heel Aberystwyth functions and by the occasional, penny-pinching tourist. It is a haunted shadow of its former self, a backwoodsman aristocrat of a building now on its uppers that is faded and might have been forgotten forever but for the search for the Holy Grail.

For hundreds of years, generations - in particular, the more drugged-up of the 1960s hippies - have believed that a cup housed at Nanteos was the Grail. The “Nanteos Cup”, as it became known, arrived there after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, when a group of Glastonbury monks, attempting to escape the ravages of Henry VIII’s commissioners, ran first to Strata Florida Abbey, in South Wales, and then over the hills to nearby Nanteos House, the old country home of the Powell family.

The former Prior of Glastonbury became chaplain to the family and the other monks became servants around the estate. Only when the last monk was on his deathbed did he reveal that the Holy Grail had not been left behind in Glastonbury but that his group had brought it with them. He entrusted it to the Powells “until the church shall claim her own”.

Nanteos, the Welsh name for Nightingale Brook, was rebuilt in 1739 by Thomas Powell, the MP for Cardiganshire, who was married to the wealthy sister of the then Lord Mayor of London. It was a square house of enormous grandeur, three miles from Aberystwyth, that drew elements of its design from Sir John Vanbrugh’s Castle Howard. It was similar in height and length and divided into three bays. Built of local stone with decorative stonework, it was set in broad, landscaped parkland. And in an upstairs room was housed the five-inch wide, three-inch deep Nanteos Cup.

For the next two centuries the cup stood behind glass, apparently performing miracles and attracting pilgrims by the hundred. Richard Wagner - who wrote the Grail opera Parsifal - made a visit to see it at the invitation of the then heir to the house, George Powell, a masochistic homosexual with a fondness for the birch and the works of the Marquis de Sade. Powell, who was friends with the poet Algernon Swinburne and fed roast monkey flesh to Guy de Maupassant, believed that the cup possessed miraculous healing powers. Water poured into it was sent around the world to those afflicted with various diseases and ailments.

Others mocked the idea that it was the Holy Grail and thought it more likely to be a 12th-century artefact that had been brought back from the Crusades. But, whether real or fake, it turned into little more than a sliver of chewed wood over the years, due to pilgrims biting large chunks out of it. And when the last of the Powells died in 1952, the house (and the cup) were sold to a Major Merrilees, who later moved to Herefordshire, taking the Nanteos Cup with him, and later depositing it in a bank vault somewhere in the county.

The current owners, apparently, neither want the publicity nor any more bites taken out of the cup. It did, however, make an appearance in a television documentary in 1997, although its whereabouts remained a tightly guarded secret.

Carys Hedd is the caretaker and, currently, the only resident of Nanteos. She is a slight, ethereal figure dressed in battle fatigue trousers and clogs. When I arrived, she was sitting at her computer in a spartan room that was cheered up by a few crystals dangling in the window and a cheap, portable hi-fi churning out New World music. The sound spilled into the barren grand hall, which was redolent of incense and the wood-burning fire of the previous night. It is where Carys plays her guitar at night… the last hippie at the last home of the Holy Grail.

We walked through the house and grounds, admiring the old gamekeeper’s cottage and the stables rebuilt in the 1830s with a neo-classical entrance. There is a dog cemetery outside the derelict, two-acre walled garden where Gin and Roman and the bones of other faithful old friends lie.

The main hall, with its fine, stone fireplace and moulded plaster wall panels, leads into a stone-flagged hall with a pair of massive Tuscan plaster columns and an elegant dog-leg staircase constructed from oaks from the estate. On the walls are a few portraits of forgotten Powell worthies.

Upstairs there is a magnificent music room, with elaborate cornices and plasterwork, and the main bedrooms (one of which is now a dowdy bridal suite labelled “boudoir suite” in brass on the door). Finally, I saw the room where the Nanteos Cup once lived. It is now an en-suite bathroom.

As we climbed up to the third floor, used some years ago as quarters for students from Aberystwyth University and since left to moulder, Carys apologised for not having the keys to give us access to the roof. It was not, as I imagined, because she wanted me to admire the fine view but because, as she told me breathlessly, the Incredible String Band had once played there.

Next week, Nanteos goes on the market for the third time in four decades. FPDSavills is asking for offers in excess of £1.25 million for the house that was, until the 1950s, a shrine to the “small shard of crumbling wood in its glass case”. The cup, wherever it is, cannot be bought - what price the Holy Grail? - but the Palladian mansion that became famous as its home can.

“It is the most important house to go on sale in Wales for years,” according to John Vaughan, of FPDSavills. The building is sound and structurally solid, although Mr Vaughan admits it is a little weary. “It is very unusual to find such a wonderful building in less than perfect repair,” he says. “They have nearly always been kept in reasonably habitable condition, passed on by the family and cared for. Nanteos is like a lost, Georgian house in Ireland or Scotland. It is a chance for somebody with real imagination to restore it to its former glory without huge expense.”

The odds are that it will become a boutique hotel. But Carys and I would prefer it to go to a sympathetic hippie.

It may be too late for the cup to do for Nanteos what the Shroud did for Turin, but pilgrimages by old hippies could still be on the cards as they come to worship where the Incredible String Band once played.

In http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

An Englishman’s home is his castle in France. From the tower, he can watch for advancing guests through slit-arrow windows. The garden is enclosed by low stone walls and walnut trees, and inside the house there are medieval fireplaces and stone éviers (sinks). His castle would probably be a National Trust property if it were in this country. But in France, houses with watchtowers are two-a-penny, and the British owner can use stones from a crumbling wall in the garden to build a barbecue without incurring the wrath of a heritage organisation.

We are much more fond of these obtuse-shaped buildings than the French. Only a Brit would go to the trouble of converting a cupboard-sized tower room into a Sleeping Beauty-style bedroom. “They love France’s heritage,” says Trevor Leggett, of Leggett Immobilier. “And often they do a much better job at looking after it.” When a property doesn’t have a tower, the disgruntled English owner has been known to build one from scratch - much to the amusement of French stonemasons.

In the 11th century, however, a tower was vital if you wanted to be taken seriously in regions such as Limousin or the Lot. Les Chemins de Jacques, the routes from northern European countries to the shrine of St Jacques de Compostelle in northern Spain, converge in the southern regions of France and are littered with square watchtowers. They were built on hilltops and designed to provide a 360-degree view of the surrounding countryside.

Pilgrims and Les Templiers (the Knights Templar) stayed in them as they crusaded through Europe.

“Nobody was safe for very long in those days,” says Charles Smallwood, from Agence L’Union. “The basic concept was you would be able to see the enemy. The towers were quite easy to defend with two-metre thick walls - how they built them, I don’t know.”

But they were built to last. Castel de Perilhac, in Limousin, with a particularly elegant watchtower, was once the local headquarters of the Knights Templar, and is now on the market for €549,000 (Savills 0207 016 3740). It enjoys uninterrupted views across the local hilltops and features a particularly fine fireplace with stone columns and a mezzanine library. There is a second cottage and wonderful gardens, filled with roses.

Towers remained popular for the next few centuries, gradually becoming more of an architectural feature than a military look-out post. Many lost their roofs in the 18th century, when a tower tax was brought in - rather like England’s window tax. But the tall structures, often attached to the most meagre barn, are still a prominent feature on the French landscape and make excellent, château-style second homes - once you have fixed the roof.

Château de Labistoul, the remains of an 11th-century tower in Tarn, predates the well-known citadel town of Cordessur- Ciel, five miles away. It is a perfect country home-away-from-home with a six-bedroom family house, a second house with four bedrooms, two swimming pools, a stocked lake and stables (€1,600,000, Savills 0207 016 3740).

But towers in France don’t have to cost more than a million. Tour Anne, a fortified medieval tower, 20 minutes from the cathedral town of Albi (home to the Toulouse Lautrec Museum), is a snip at €275,000. It was used to guard the local bridge and has been restored to include a living room, kitchen, two spacious bedrooms and a wine cellar.

If the French weren’t so keen on eating pigeons (and their eggs), they might have stopped building towers when the Wars of Religion ended in the 16th century. But they discovered the walls made excellent nesting sites for pigeons, particularly when the slit windows were enlarged, allowing the fatter birds to fly in and out.

New towers were built with hundreds of boulins (pigeonholes) inside, and when landowners realised pigeon dung made good fertiliser for vines, pigeonniers sprung up all over the countryside. These were not mere farm buildings; they were built in flamboyant square and octagonal architectural styles and given prominent positions on estates, sometimes mounted on pillars or over archways. Pigeon-keeping, until the French Revolution in 1789, was a privilege reserved for the nobility and clergy - and pigeonniers thus a sign of status and power.

“Architecturally, they are often more beautiful than the towers,” says Mr Smallwood. “They add such fascination to each building. They are like little châteaux but have none of the upkeep problems.” Pigeon-keeping was deeply unpopular with anyone who wasn’t nobility and clergy; the pigeons from the great estates fattened themselves up on the peasants’ crops, before being eaten by monks and aristocrats.

Some peasants built secret pigeonniers in their lofts but, on the whole, pigeons were detested. Thankfully, the French didn’t pull down the pigeonniers after the Revolution and the buildings can be converted into interesting holiday accommodation.

The pigeonnier at a stonebuilt property near Cajarc on the River Lot (€426,000 Agence L’Union, 00 33 5 6330 6024) has been transformed into a bedroom/study, looking out across beautiful gardens.

At a property in Tarn et Garonne, the large pigeonnier has been attached to the house, creating more accommodation (€795,000 Agence L’Union, as above). A roof terrace with a bolet (a tiled canopy, popular in south-west France) makes the most of the hilltop location.

Meanwhile, a perfectly formed pigeonnier in the village of Beuregard in the Lot (€155,000, Savills 0207 016 3740) has been converted into a love-nest with circular kitchen and bedroom and two acres of garden.

For someone looking for their own project, a forgotten pigeonnier in woodland on a 250-acre hunting estate in the Dordogne could be transformed into an idyllic holiday house (€900,000, Leggett 08700 11 51 51).

The stately pigeonnier near the town of Duras, in Lot et Garonne, was built on a vineyard to make the unglamorous task of transporting pigeon dung to the vines as easy as possible. However, there is no doubt that it could be converted into an appealing mini-château, with the original boulins as windows (Leggett 08700 11 51 51).

The surrounding vineyards, which produce yearly harvests of Semillion/ Sauvignon/Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon/Franc grapes and a large ancient farmhouse (also unrenovated) are included in the €339,200 price, providing the perfect French country estate for a wine-drinking Francophile.

In http://www.telegraph.co.uk