“He who received five talents went and used them in business and acquired other five talents; in the same way, he who received two talents acquired other two; and he who received one talent went and buried [it] in the ground and hid his master's silver."
(Gospel of Matthew 25: 14-23)
Spring is coming, and there it is already not far from summer. Someone will go on vacation abroad and may well end up in the Chinon castle on the Loire. Well, suddenly … Of course, there is a museum, furnished with replicas of antique furniture. Excavations are underway in the most ruined part of the castle. The history of the castle is closely connected with the history of Jeanne d'Arc. However, the most interesting thing that can be seen in it is … several mysterious images carved on a stone wall. They are sure to be shown, talked about, and, nevertheless, few people know that in front of him, perhaps, there is a key to the treasures of the legendary Templars.
Chinon Castle in the city of Chinon, on the banks of the Vienne River, is one of the royal castles of the Loire. By the way, there are only 8100 inhabitants in the town of Chinon today!
And it so happened that, ironically, the death of the Knights Templar began on Friday, October 13, 1307. Then the last Grand Master of the Order of the Knights Templar, Jacques de Molay, was arrested in the Temple - the residence of the order, located on the outskirts of Paris. Then, three weeks later, secret instructions were sent out by Philip IV to the royal officials, after which mass arrests of the Templars began in France. And then a loud and long-term trial of the order began, after which it was burned at the stake.
Jacques de Molay
Meanwhile, Jacques de Molay was still alive when the Most Holy Council met in Vienna on October 16, 1311 in order to consider the charges against the Knights Templar and at the same time reform the Church. The holy fathers, having become acquainted with the protocols of the papal commissions, refused to make a decision before the defense of the knights of the Temple was heard.
The Pope strongly opposed this. And in 1312 he published a bull Vox clamantis *, in which he stated his point of view on this matter:
“Given the bad reputation of the Templars, the suspicions and accusations against them; considering the mysterious ways and rituals of admission to this order, the bad and anti-Christian behavior of many of its members; especially considering that they are sworn not to reveal anything from the admission ceremony and never to leave the order; Considering that shameful rumors will not stop as long as the order exists; considering, in addition to the danger that the Faith and the souls of men are exposed to, as well as the disgusting atrocities of extremely many members of the order; Considering, finally, that the Roman Church dissolved other glorified orders for much lesser misdeeds, we abolish, not without bitterness and heartache, by virtue of not a judicial verdict, but by an apostolic decision, or ordinance, the aforementioned order of the Templars with all its branches …"
Coat of arms of Jacques de Molay
But then went completely earthly: on May 2 of the same year, in his bull Ad providam **, the Pope decided to seize the property of the Templars. The preamble affirmed the need to rip out the thorns of evil and emphasized the following: we were not given justification, but previously, that is, by the apostolic ordinance, which is not subject to appeal and has eternal force. From now on, we forbid anyone to join this order, wear it and fulfill the Templars' charter on pain of excommunication from the Church, which ipso facto *** comes into effect."
The order is abolished, the survivors - if any - face excommunication. The following was written about the seizure of property:
“We made the final decision to permanently attach this property to the possessions of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem … We give, concede, unite, turn on and present forever to the Order of the Hospitallers … all the property that the Order of the Temple possessed in France, the Master and brothers from the militia at the time of arrest them, that is, in the month of October one thousand three hundred and seventh year."
Execution of the Templars - the Grand Master Jacques de Molay and Geoffroy de Charnet.
The exceptions were the kingdoms of Castile, Aragon, Portugal, Mallorca: the property located in them and outside France was transferred to the disposal of the Holy See. However, the “cash desks” of the commanderships, as well as the treasures of the Templars, did not fall into the hands of Philip the Fair. In Guillaume de Plesian's speech to the Pope, there is a noticeable dissatisfaction about this: "For in many parts of the world they have fortified their castles against the Church and her servants, sheltered and divided their property, squandered it completely, including the sacred vessels themselves …"
In other words, the king's officers were unable to find any money or even sacred vessels! And here is the question: where, in that case, did all this go? The royal henchmen found only what could not be taken with them - agricultural tools and livestock, as well as the property received as a pledge or deposited.
Gate to the castle: Clock Tower.
No gold, no silver, no documents, and from the archives - only those papers that were related to the acquisition of land by the Templars, the purchase and other documents of land holding. Two explanations can be given here: either the officers of Philip the Handsome got hold of this property, or the order of arrest prepared ahead of time turned out to be not so secret, information about it somehow became known to the Templars, and they managed to take appropriate measures.
Of course, the overwhelming majority of the commanders had only the necessary funds - large sums of money were of no use to them; however, those located at “key” trade intersections had to have substantial cash to pay bills of exchange, so the question of “where's the money” arose even then. And on its basis, legends about the hidden treasures of the Templars appeared. And there is every reason to believe that most of these legends are not lying. Or they didn’t lie in the past, since, of course, no one ever reported on the treasures found.
In fact, there are a lot of hypotheses about where the Templar gold could have been hidden. However, it is quite logical to assume that each of their commandership had its own cache: and, although the Templars inspired terror in the robbers, the houses of the Temple could not always provide protection from military detachments or large gangsters. And these hiding places, undoubtedly, appeared a long time ago. It is possible that especially valuable property was kept in them all the time, which was in the tradition of the Middle Ages.
Bridge to the castle over a dry moat.
That is, the treasures of the Templars could very well exist and, moreover, could be hidden in one of the Order's commanders! Here, however, it is necessary to take into account some important circumstances. The fact is that in the commanderships that went under the papal ordinance to the Hospitallers, the most thorough searches were made, but no matter how much they looked, they did not find anything, so this leaves little chance of success for the current treasure hunters.
Model of the castle in the castle museum.
Further, some of the Templars who escaped from Philip the Fair could visit the caches they knew and take away the property hidden there. The secret of the most significant caches, most likely, was passed on only to initiates, as well as instructions on where and how to look for them. And here we can assume that the key to unraveling the gold of the Templars is … graffiti on the castle wall in Chinon, which appeared as follows. As soon as it was decided to establish papal commissions of inquiry, Clement V announced that he would personally consider the cases of the highest dignitaries of the order. During a trip to France, he chose the city of Poitiers as the place of his temporary stay and demanded that they be delivered to him there for interrogation.
Tourist plan of the castle.
The king and the inquisitors could not ignore such a request from the pope. And the train with the captives set off from Paris to Poitiers. But when Tours appeared ahead, the trip was interrupted under the pretext of illness, as if caught by prisoners, who were then taken to the Chinon castle, which belonged to the king of France and stood on the land of the royal domain. The prisoners stayed there for some time. They never had a chance to meet with dad, and then they were returned to Paris again.
Bussy Tower
But during the days that were spent in Chinon, the prisoners managed to carve drawings of a completely extraordinary quality on the stone walls of their casemate. All of them are symbolic, and many are directly related to the initiation rite - these are flaming hearts, a cross, a triple fence, a field with squares, carbuncles.
It was in such premises that the Templars were kept …
And the question involuntarily arises: why did the prisoners need to cut out these symbols, which in themselves did not represent any secret? The secret could only be how to use it all. It can be assumed that these drawings were the fruit of forced indolence - the prisoners were killing time by carving some obscure drawings on the walls. However, what if these aren't just drawings? What if they are puzzles? And what if Chinon's graffiti were addressed to people who not only knew these symbols, but also knew how to read them. After all, it is quite possible that there was a special, "Templar" way of reading them.
And the prisoners, portraying them, decided to turn to their brothers: not to remind them of famous symbols or to entrust banal truths, but to convey with their help a message that only they could read and understand. The message is secret, since we are talking about real things hidden in the real world.
Suppose one of the dignitaries carved a cross topped with a heart. It is a symbol. Christian symbol among others; however, not only Christian, but very well known - it can be found in almost all religious buildings. No one would have thought to attach any special significance to it.
However, the heart can be drawn in different ways. It may be correct or flawed. And the flaw in the heart takes on special significance: first of all for those who are accustomed to deciphering certain systems of symbolic cryptography - for example, a certain cryptography of the Templars. A similar flaw in a drawing could mean a place - graphically or phonetically. And where the ignorant could see only a cross crowned with a heart, the enlightened one, perhaps, will learn the following:
"In such-and-such commanding (the notorious flaw in the heart), the cache is in the core under the cross." And only brothers who have passed the initiation ceremony can read this. It is clear that there is no evidence to substantiate this hypothesis, but it seems to be quite logical.
Here are these very strange-looking drawings with the inscription: "I pray to the Lord for forgiveness" and the image of a burning heart, which are attributed to Jacques de Molay himself. A lot of research has been devoted to them, and it is safe to say that there is simply no better gift for all lovers of conspiracy and esoteric sciences. They note that they have similarities with the graffiti that were made by the templars who were contained in the tower of the city of Domme, but that's all.
By the way, this hypothesis is supported by one more fact: Chinon's graffiti are not just scratched into the stone wall, which any prisoner languishing in captivity could have done with the point of a nail, no, they are knocked out very deeply, although not with a very skillful hand. These drawings look like a real bas-relief; it is obvious that they were made with the intention of preserving them for as long as possible. That is, it is quite possible that the gold of the Templars, which neither the Pope nor Philip the Handsome received in this way, is still waiting in the wings in some hidden cache forgotten by both God and people … These are strange drawings carved on the walls, the main of which is the scaffold (or Golgotha?) with the inscription: "I pray to the Lord for forgiveness" and a flaming heart (kurbuncul?) are attributed by some to de Molay himself. A lot of research has been devoted to them, and they are a real gift for lovers of conspiracy and esotericism. It should also be noted their certain similarity with the graffiti left by the templars in the tower of the city of Domme, where other arrested members of the order were kept.
* Voice of indignation (lat.). Papal bulls are usually named after the first words of the text.
** For care (lat.).
*** By virtue of the obviousness, by the very fact (lat.).
