Scotland possesses no tangible memorial of its Templars. All of its temples and preceptories have vanished. Only the name remains. Templar life in Scotland between 1129 and 1309 must be constructed from articles and documents that relate to locations or events such as the Templars’ headquarters in Scotland, or their real estate transactions. Surprisingly, these two subjects provide a wealth of information. Balantrodoch is important because it was the focal point of Templar activity in Scotland. It was the administrative and economic center. It was the location of the Templars’ primary chapel. It remained the center for Templar activity even after the formal dissolution of the Templars in 1312; it remained a community’s kirk until 1849, long after the Templars and Hospitallers were divested of their properties during the Reformation.
What is now the small village of Temple, a few miles south of Edinburgh, was at one time the Templars’ headquarters in Scotland. It was begun by the efforts of Hughes de Payens when he undertook the expansion of The Poor Fellows–Soldiers of Jesus Christ and the Temple of Solomon from the original nine knights to an international Order. His efforts went beyond the continent of Europe to England, and all the way to Scotland and the Court of King David I.
Although the towns of Temple and Roslin are only a few miles apart, few people have heard of Temple or of Balantrodoch. This is due in large part to a small chapel just south of Edinburgh known as Rosslyn Chapel, which is highlighted in Dan Brown’s very popular novel, The Da Vinci Code. 1 The Knights Templar gained immediate recognition because of a statement at the beginning of Chapter 104 which states that Rosslyn Chapel was built ‘by the Knights Templar in 1446’ and the hint that it is the repository for the Holy Grail.2 Others have said the Rosslyn Chapel holds the Templar mysteries and is a book in stone that enshrines for posterity the Templar ideals. From this has grown a large popular interest, and tourists flock there. Whether any of this is true is the subject of Chapter 9. Suffice it to say, Rosslyn Chapel totally eclipses Balantrodoch. But in its time, Balantrodoch was not just a church. It was the focal point of Templar activity with numerous buildings and activities. It, and Scotland, were the Templar lands most distant from Jerusalem. They were cold, remote, and they provided the Templars with only minimal income.
There are various versions of the events leading up to the meeting of Hughes de Payens and King David I. Some attribute it to a relationship between de Payens and the Saint Clairs. Others base it on his very successful meeting with King Henry I of England. The connection between de Payens and the Saint Clairs begins with the premise that before the founding of the Knights Templar, Hughes de Payens was married to Catherine de Saint-Clair of the Norman line of the family.3 From this, everything falls into place to support the idea of a Templar–Saint Clair relationship from prior to 1118 through the time they were dissolved by Pope Clement V in 1312 and after. This premise also provided a means of introduction to Scotland’s king, David I. But this marriage may not have happened. The foundation for the premise is not that clear. It seems that Hughes de Payens may actually have been married to Elizabeth de Chappesm, and not to Catherine de Saint-Clair.4 If this is true, then there is no other evidence that Hughes de Payens was introduced to David I by the Saint Clairs. In all probability, the introduction originated with Henry I, King of England.
The evidence for how and when Balantrodoch was transferred to the Templars varies. The most credible version begins with Hughes de Payens’ intense campaign for recruits and money after the Council of Troyes. As part of his campaign he traveled to Normandy where he was received by Henry I who presented him with gifts of gold and silver.5 But of greater importance is the fact that King Henry I gave Hughes de Payens his support, which included an introduction to David I of Scotland. Hughes de Payens was very well received by David I, and as part of the largesse bestowed upon the Templars were the lands that became known as Balantrodoch, or Baile nan Trodach – ‘Stead of the Warriors’.6 This name is believed to have followed Baile nan Trachaid (Traghad), ‘Stead of the Seashore’, from the gravel bed left by a glacier near the village of Temple. The name was changed to Stead of Warriors when it was acquired by the Templars.
At the time of the gift, David I had only been on the Scottish throne for four years. The extent of his trust and devotion to the Templars is demonstrated by the fact that he kept them around him constantly and made them judges and advisors of his conduct ‘by night and day’.7 As David’s trust in the Templars grew, they became a source of candidates for the king’s almoner, a person who was considered to be a man of the world and thus a judge of character, and qualified to give aid to those in real distress.8
Another version has it that Hughes de Payens traveled to Scotland in the summer of 1228, before the Council of Troyes and before he met with David I in Scotland.9 In this version he was traveling throughout Europe and England to gather wealth and recruits in order to gain more influence at the Council of Troyes. This version has a basis because there is a surviving letter of thanks to David I from Bernard de Clairvaux dated June 1128. The possibility is not far-fetched because of the proximity of the nearby Cistercian Abbey of Newbattle. But, there is also the explanation that the letter does not predate the Council of Troyes, because in the Middle Ages the new year began in March.
Finally, it is often stated that David I granted the manor and chapel at Balantrodoch to the Templars when they were introduced into Scotland in 1153. But this view is primarily supported by the fact that the Templars’ activity in Scotland substantially increased in the early 1150s. Also, even though Balantrodoch was the principle preceptory of Scotland, there are few records. But the name of the preceptory is well established. It is found in both the Chartulary of Aberdeen, ‘a domus Templi de Balantradock’, and the Chartulary of the Cistercian Abbey of Newbattle, ‘Magister et Fratres Templi de Blentrodoch’.10
Balantrodoch is located about eleven miles south of Edinburgh on the South Esk River. It is only a few miles from the village of Roslin, and four miles from the Cistercian Abbey of Newbattle. The temple is on a ridge above the river. Foundations for pillars have been found in the garden next to the current church ruin that are believed to be from the original Templar church. It was round like the other Templar churches, and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. But Balantrodoch was not just a temple. It would have consisted of a hall with a kitchen, administration buildings, housing for the knights, sergeants/baillis and staff, a stable and a barn, outbuildings and a mill which ground all the grain from the Templar properties in the region, including wheat from Liston. By the middle of the thirteenth century, with additional grants from Alexanders II and III, its lands extended down the Esk River to Carrington and Harvieston, and up towards the Moorfoot Hills, by Halkerston, Utterston, Rosebery, and Yorkston. Because it was in the middle of lands held by the Saint Clairs, the proximity is used as support for the theory that the Saint Clairs were actively involved in the Templars’ acquisition of Balantrodoch. But this goes back to the question of whether Hughes de Payens was married to Catherine de Saint-Clair. It is more probable that the Templars and the Saint Clairs were better described as neighbors and close business associates. The location of Balantrodoch is also used to support the theory that the Saint Clairs built Rosslyn Chapel, in part, to hide the Templar treasure that was transported out of Paris before the arrest of the Templars on Friday 13 October 1307. But, as with the wedding and the facts surrounding the acquisition of the property at Balantrodoch, the story has two or more versions.11
Regardless of how or when it was acquired, after 1229 Balantrodoch was the Templars’ main preceptory in Scotland. But because Scotland never rose to a level of province, the Templars and their land in Scotland were governed by the Master of England who governed from the Temple in London.
Another bitter irony involves the work that was carried out at Balantrodoch. In the 1200s the monks at Newbattle Abbey are said to have been mining coal and producing iron. Given the relationship between the Cistercian monks, the closeness of their abbey to Balantrodoch, and the Templars’ proclivity for making money to support their efforts in Outremer, one would think that these activities would also have been carried out by the Templars. But apparently they were not; instead, their primary economic activities were agriculture and the operation of the mill.
In addition to governing the Order in Scotland, Balantrodoch was the center for carrying out the Order’s business. Major payments to and by the Order were made there. Charters relating to the Templars’ lands were granted at Balantrodoch, and legal documents affecting Templar properties were usually signed there. The documents were drafted by clerks, who could either be brethren or employees who were not members of the Order. Major disputes were settled there, as were appointments to offices.
The Templars in Scotland were not bankers. Banking was done at the London Temple, which has been described as a thirteenth-century Bank of England. The London Temple was used by the kings of Scotland as well as the English kings and nobility.12 For example, in 1225 Queen Ermengarde, the widow of William the Lion, bought property in order to found the monastery of Balmerinoch. The deeds for the monastery were deposited in the London Temple and held there until the money was paid. The exchange then also took place there. In another transaction, Roger le Bigod paid 2,000 pounds of silver on behalf of King Alexander II at the London Temple. Then, in 1282, Alexander III paid a debt there. Alexander III also used the London Temple to handle the payment of the dowry for his sister Isabella.
The use of the Temple in London is consistent with evidence given at the Scottish inquisition, when the knights stated that all of the Templars in Scotland were born in England. But, when one became a Templar, one lost his nationality and became a soldier of Christendom and not of any particular country or kingdom.13 In fact, Scottish Templars served in France and Cyprus, as well as the Holy Land.14
The hierarchy at Balantrodoch was the same as at any other Templar preceptory. There were only two basic levels of Templars: The knights, who wore the white tunic with the red Templar cross, and the sergeants, who took the Templar vows but wore the Templar cross on a black or brown robe. They served as esquires, tending the horses and working the fields or mills at the preceptories. The other level was the chaplains, ordinary ecclesiastics who had been admitted to the Order so they could perform services and administer the sacrament to the brethren.15 The Templars in Scotland, like all the others, were bound to the daily observance of all the canonical hours, from Matins in the early morning to Compline before they went to bed. In the refectory they ate their meal in silence while someone read from the scripture or a sacred legend. Four days a week they abstained from meat. Wine was used sparingly. On Fridays they ate nothing but Lenten food and drink. Conversation was forbidden after the brethren left the refectory. It was undoubtedly a frustratingly austere life considering that there were no battles and little, if any, need for weap-ons. The Templars were businessmen and absentee farmers who would be described today as upper-middle management, but without the perks that would come with such a position.
Unlike the preceptories in England, there were no inventories taken for Balantrodoch and Maryculter during the Templars’ arrest and inquisition. But because the Templar Knights in Scotland were Englishmen, who were transferred from England to Scotland and back, it can be assumed that the lifestyles were comparable. And the Templars lived frugally; the hall would contain simple tables, chairs and a washbasin. The living chamber would be a dormitory with a bed and a clothes bag for each Templar. For eating, each person might have a spoon. Even this might have been generous; in Denny, eastern England, there was only one spoon for every two Templars. In terms of goods and cash, only a small amount was kept on hand.16 The Templar Knights were not known to be terribly literate, and it appears that they kept no books other than service manuals.17 Judging from the chapel inventory at the preceptory at Denny in eastern England, it appears that the chapel would have been well supplied with such things as vestments, cloths, chalices, cruets, and religious books.18
While the knights were unable to personally enjoy the fruits of their labor, the preceptory enjoyed numerous privileges. The Templars were exempt from scot (taxes and assessments), gild (membership), from attendance at the king’s host and in his courts, from the casualties of ward and relief, and from all services connected with the royal castles, fleets, parks and houses.19 In 1180, among other Templar privileges was the right to have one man, called a hospes, in each borough. The hospes would hold his Templar toft or tenement (fenced dwellings and outbuildings) in fee and heritage ‘as freely and quietly, fully and honourable, as any burgess holding of us holds and possess any donation [elemosinam] granted to us’.20 The extensive privileges are set forth at length in the charter of King Alexander which confirms those granted by Kings David I, Malcolm IV and William I, and includes ‘buying and selling their merchandise everywhere, free of cain (livestock or produce from the land paid as rent), toll and passage-duty, and all other freights and customs’.21
Special privileges of this kind, while evidence of early popularity, gradually incited general antipathy. Pushed to their extreme limits, the existence of these privileges caused the emergence of powerful enemies who were banded together by envy. As the early glamor of the crusades wore off, the laity became indifferent; crusading ceased to be a source of inspiration. Even the Church began to accommodate itself to the gradually changing views. For example, it granted exemptions on somewhat easy terms to those who had taken Templar vows and afterwards changed their minds. Caesarius of Heisterback narrates the tale of a miller who, after becoming a Templar, bought himself out of the Order by paying five marks. When he learned that he might have had to pay forty marks, he had to brag about it at the local tavern:
Ye fools will cross the seas and waste your substance and expose your lives to manifold dangers, while I shall sit at home with my wife and children, and get a like reward to yours through the five marks with which I redeemed my cross.
But the miller should have kept his mouth shut because a short time later he received his comeuppance. He was forced to ride on a coal black horse without food or water in the company of a swarthy individual mounted on an equally sable steed. He died in three days, ‘and thus unrepentant, unconfessed, unanointed and unaneled’, declares the chronicler, ‘He found his grave in hell’. Also, the priest forbade him a Christian burial, but ultimately had his own shortcomings because he took a bribe from the miller’s wife to lay him in the churchyard. The priest’s bribe was discovered and he was accused in the Synod of Utrecht and received his punishment.22
The house at Balantrodoch, and probably the one at Maryculter were undoubtedly built in the same style as those in England which were half-baronial, half-monastic type structures.23 They would have had strongly fortified towers, an enceinte enclosing a stately hall which served as a refectory, and a chapel which, like that of the Temple in London, appears to have been circular.
Balantrodoch is among the few Templar relics that remain on Scottish soil. While its temple was undoubtedly circular, it would have been considerably more modest than the London Temple. Unfortunately, it was substantially remodeled by the Hospitallers after 1308, and by the Protestants after the Reformation. As a result, it is now a rectangular, single-celled chapel that is eighteen feet wide by fifty-five feet long.
At no period in time were there many Templar Knights in Scotland. Generally there were from three to five knights, and about the same number of chaplains. Extrapolating from the information from England there were usually around 100 sergeants out of a total of 141 Templars in London. This means there would have been about 25 to 30 sergeants in Scotland.24 With no known records it is impossible to be certain, but these numbers are consistent with the personnel needed to manage in excess of 600 properties in Scotland. At the time of the Templars’ arrest in Scotland there were four known knights: Walter de Clifton the Preceptor, William de Middleton, and two others who fled, John de Huseflete and Thomas Totti, né Tocci (who later gave himself up).25
The Scottish Chief of Balantrodoch was usually a Master, but in the absence of a Master, he was the Preceptor of the House of the Temple of Scotland. His territory was bounded in the south by the River Tweed and extended to the northernmost tip of Scotland. The Masters/Preceptors were not independent, and they were not linked to France. They owed their allegiance to the Master in London. Further, the known Masters were not Scots, but Englishmen. As long as Scotland was at peace with England, everything was fine. Consider that David I made both the local monks and the Templars the ‘custodians of his morals’.26 But when disputes arose between England and Scotland, the Templars initially sided with the English.
The names of only a few Masters/Preceptors are known, and the information is not always consistent. The following are the known Preceptors at Balantrodoch.27
| Robert | 1160 |
| Bartholomew | 1165–116928 |
| Ranulph de Corbet | 1174–99 |
| Hughes de Conyers | c. 1233 |
| Roger de Akiney | 1278–90 |
| Brian de Jay | 1286–92 |
| John de Sautre | 1292– ? |
| John de Huseflete | 1304–06 |
| Walter de Clifton | 1306–09 |
In 1240 the Templar Master was Patrick, Earl of Dunbar, who died in Marseilles on the way to the Egyptian crusade. But another Templar Master, whose name is unknown, also left Scotland to participate in the Egyptian crusade. He did take part in it, and is listed by his title as the one who facilitated the payment of the ransom for King Louis.29
When the Templars were dissolved, and the inquisition was announced, John de Huseflete fled. He may have been followed by William de Middleton, another Englishman, who identified himself at the inquisition as a Preceptor.
Of all Scotland’s Masters, the one that is most prominent is Brian de Jay. Brian de Jay and his successor John de Sautre were both Englishmen. Both were killed at Falkirk fighting for King Edward I against William Wallace. There is an oft-repeated story involving Brian de Jay, a widow and an estate at Esperston that begins before Brian de Jay was the Master of Balantrodoch.30 It ends in 1354 at Balantrodoch, fifty-six years after Brian de Jay’s death.31 It is often said that the events of this episode stand out as evidence of the Templars’ avarice: that they were the keepers of wealth and promoters of gross injustice, instead of being the keepers of morals; that as the Templars’ wealth increased, their early ideals of self-sacrifice and chivalry faded away, and were replaced by arrogance, cruelty and greed. In Scotland, as in France, it appears that it was this image that ultimately caused the Order to be brought to an end.
The story highlights the fact that the Templars were not only bankers who developed letters of credit, they also developed the concept of an annuity. The tale begins when William, the son of Geoffrey of Halkerston – who was known be fonder of ease than of labor – conveyed his wife Christiana’s estate at Esperston to the Templars for the duration of his life. William was then received into the preceptory at Balantrodoch and was maintained there for the rest of his life. His wife and children then had to live in a small house at the corner of the property with a small income that barely provided them with the necessities of life. In other words, William gave the Templars a life estate. The Templars agreed to support him for life at Balantrodoch in exchange for the profits from the property.
At William’s death, the small house was to be conveyed back to his wife. But it wasn’t. Instead, Brian de Jay, as Master of the Temple in Scotland, took a group of his followers to the house to evict the widow and her children. She refused to leave and slammed the door in his face, claiming that her husband could not dispose of her patrimony. Not to be discouraged, Brian de Jay told his men to break in and drag her out. They did, but ‘as the poor woman clung desperately with both hands to the door of her dwelling, a ruffian in the band unsheathed his dagger and cut off one of her fingers’.32 Brian de Jay then ‘took possession of the house and inheritance from which she had been iniquitously expelled’.
But the story did not end there. Later, after the widow’s finger had healed, King Edward I of England was lodging nearby at Newbattle. She gained an audience and convinced the king to issue a royal writ in chancery to restore her inheritance. The widow then moved back in and lived there until the outbreak of Scotland’s War of Independence. A consequence of the war was that the courts were closed. Brian de Jay took advantage of this, and the Templars again, for a second time, forcibly threw the widow out of her house.
In the summer of 1298, when Brian de Jay was in Balantrodoch with a large body of Welsh mercenaries on his way to join Edward I at Falkirk, the widow’s eldest son, Richard Cook, approached Brian de Jay and pleaded his mother’s cause. Brian de Jay seemed sympathetic. He promised that if Richard would lead the Welsh troops to their destination at Liston, all would be made right. Richard kept his part of the bargain, and guided the Welsh troops to their destination. But unfortunately, Brian de Jay had given a separate order to the Welsh captain to kill Richard. The following day Richard was slain. As a result the land remained in the hands of the Templars.
Brian de Jay was also killed in the Battle of Falkirk, three days after the slaying of Richard. There are several versions of how Brain de Jay met his death. One chronicler reports that he died at the start of the battle. Another states that he died charging the Scottish schiltrons. The third version has Brian de Jay chasing several Scots through a bog when his horse floundered and he was killed by the Scots he was chasing. Regardless of which version is correct, Brian de Jay met his end as a fighting knight.
The Templars retained possession of Esperston until 1312 when, during the reign of Robert the Bruce, a son of Christiana regained the property through proceedings before the Sheriff and Bailli of Edinburgh. Then, in 1354, William and Christiana’s heir, Robert Semple, petitioned for restoration of his family’s right to possess the estate. His petition was granted and he regained control of the family’s estate. Several facts are significant. While the proceeding was civil in nature, it was not held before a civil court such as common pleas. It was conducted by the Hospitallers, but not at the preceptory of the Hospitallers which was Torphichen. Instead it took place at the Templars’ preceptory at Balantrodoch by a court of thirteen men who were tenants there.33 Also, the proceeding was conducted by Thomas de Lindesay, Master of the Knights of Saint John and the Temple.
Because there are so few records of Balantrodoch, what information there is, is anecdotal. An example is the Latin inscription that is chiseled into separate, apparently salvaged stones set into the top of the belfry or east gable of the current church, which states:
VAE SAC
IMI·HM
These letters have been the subject of much curiosity and debate after their discovery. There was no widely held understanding of it and the interpretation is still a matter of immense speculation.34 But each of the better known interpretations is imaginative.
James Burnes in 1840 thought that the letters, when extended, might mean Virgini Aedem Sacram Jilitia Templi Hierosolymae Magister because the Virgin Mary was the patroness of the Order.35
The Illustrated Architectural Guide to Midlothian (1995) interprets the letters to read ‘Vienne Sacrum Militibus Johannis Hierosolymitani Melitensibus’, or ‘The sacred Council of Vienna to the Knights of St John of Jerusalem and Malta’.36
Jeff Nisbet proposed that it is a coded reference to the theory attributed to the Templars of the bloodline descending from Jesus and Mary Magdalene. He also argues that it is tied to a voyage of Henry St Clair, Earl of Orkney, to America in the late fourteenth century.37
Balantrodoch appears to be one of the few Templar properties in Scotland that was actually transferred to the Hospitallers. It was after the transfer that the Temple’s configuration began to change to its current rectangular shape.38 Its name ultimately became ‘Temple’. This process began before the fifteenth century when Sir William Knollis, Grand Preceptor of the Order of St John, obtained an Act of Parliament changing the name ‘Temple’ to ‘The Barony of St John’. But the name was not accepted by the people in the area and the name has always remained simply ‘Temple’.
The Temple remained in the hands of the Knights of St John until 1535 when they lost their control because of the Protestant revolution, and specifically because of Henry VIII’s Act of Reformation. After that, the chapel became the area’s Protestant church. This was formalized in the next century, in 1618, when the name was changed to reflect the fact that ‘Temple’ applied to the area, not just the chapel. The area became known as the Parish of Temple.
The chapel was continuously used as the parish kirk until 1840. By then, because of its age and maintenance costs, it had become so dilapidated that a new church was built.
But the original chapel still stands, although, as shown in Figure 4, it is now a ruin with no roof or windows. Those who visit this peaceful and tranquil village find the remains of a stone chapel that is filled with history and memories.
1 Doubleday (New York, 2003).
2 Brown, The Da Vinci Code, p. 432.
3 Sinclair, Andrew, The Sword and the Grail, Crown Publishers (New York, 1982). See Baigent, Michael, Leigh, Richard & Lincoln, Henry, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, Delacorte Press (New York, 1982), p. 391.
4 Coppens, Philip, The Stone Puzzle of Rosslyn Chapel, Frontier Publishing (Netherlands, 2004), p. 14, citing Hugues de Payns, Chevalier Champenoise, Fondateur de l’ Ordre des Templiers (Troyes: editions de la Maison Boulanger, 1997).
5 Barber, Malcolm, The Military Orders, Fighting for the Faith and Caring for the Sick, Variorium, Ashgate Publishing (Hampshire, 1994), p. 143.
6 Coutts, Rev. Alfred, The Knights Templar in Scotland (Edinburgh, 1890), p. 7.
7 Aitken, Robert, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, The Scottish Review (July 1898), p. 4.
8 Edwards, John, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, Transactions of the Scottish Ecclesiological Society, Vol. IV (Aberdeen, 1912–1915), p. 41.
9 Barber, Malcolm, The New Knighthood, A History of the Order of theTemple, Cambridge University Press, Canto edition (New York, 1995), p. 14.
10 Burnes, James, Sketch of the History of the Knights Templars, 2nd edn, Wm. Blackwood & Sons (Edinburgh, 1840), pp. 55–56.
11 See the discussion in Chapter 9, ‘Roslyn Chapel’ infra.
12 Aitken, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 21.
13 Ibid., p. 15.
14 Cowan, Ian B., Mackay, P.H.R. & Macquarrie, Alan, The Knights of St. John of Jerusalem In Scotland, Scottish History Society (Edinburgh, 1983), p. xxiii.
15 Aitken, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 16.
16 Lord, Evelyn, The Knights Templar in Britain, Pearson Education Limited (Edinburgh, 2002), pp. 130, 131.
17 Ibid., p. 108.
18 Ibid., p. 65.
19 Aitken, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 9.
20 Edwards, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, Transactions, p. 38.
21 Cowan, Mackay & Macquarrie, The Knights of St.John of Jerusalem in Scotland, pp. 41–42.
22 Edwards, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 39. The nature of the punishment is unknown.
23 Described in the following chapter.
24 See: Edwards, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 42, and Perkins, Clarence, ‘The Knights Templars in the British Isles’, The English Historical Review (April 1910), p. 222.
25 Cowan, Mackay & Macquarrie, The Knights of St.John of Jerusalem in Scotland, p. xxii.
26 Edwards, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, Transactions.
27 Cowan, Mackay & Macquarrie, The Knights of St.John of Jerusalem in Scotland, p. 192.
28 Bartholomew could also have been the Master between 1260 and 1265.
29 Aitken, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 22.
30 Brian de Jay was later elevated to be the Master of England and lived at the Templar House in London.
31 The full story is set forth in a charter by Brother Thomas de Lindesay, Master of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem, to Robert, Son of Alexander Wimple of Haukerstoun (the charter of 1354) at ‘Blantordokis’ [Balantrodoch], which is reproduced in an article by John Edwards, ‘The Templars in Scotland in the Thirteenth Century’, published in the Scottish Historical Review, 1908. The article contains the charter transcribed in Latin and translated into English.
32 Aitken, ‘The Knights Templar in Scotland’, p. 24.
33 Balantrodoch was administered by William Slyeth, Bailiff; Adam Morcell, Sergeant; and Adam de Wedale, Forester. Others signing the charter of 1354 were Adam de Hermistoun, Thomas de Megeth, Alan de Yorkystoun, Adam de Wedeale, Alan de Wedale, John de Catkoyne, Alan son of Symon de Heriouth, Thomas son of Hugo de Middleton, and John Bell de Locworward.
34 Proceedings of the Society of the Antiquaries, ‘Temple Midlothian’ (1911–1912), p. 409.
35 Burnes, Sketch of the History of the Knights Templar, p. 56.
36 Mander, Bob, ‘Balantrodoch: The Scottish Temple’, in The Templar Papers, ed. Oddvar Olsen, New Page Books (Forest Lakes, 2006), p. 187.
37 Fortean Times, May 2001.
38 Mander, ‘Balantrodoch’, The Templar Papers, p. 179.