The Temple in London is a strange place, even in name. It was built by the Knights Templar and consecrated by the Patriarch of Jerusalem, on a visit to London, in 1185.
The headquarters of the Templars in Jerusalem was thought to be the Temple of Solomon, but in fact was the al-Aqsa mosque, dating in part from the seventh century. The round Temple church in London, though, was modelled on the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, specifically on the externally round stone housing or aedicule over the spot of the empty tomb of Jesus.
An idea was widespread in the Middle Ages that all churches were, in a way, other versions of the Holy Sepulchre, for the death and Resurrection of Jesus were enacted at the altar as they had been in Jerusalem. Not all round churches were built by Templars.
The Templars, it goes without saying, were unlike their image in The Da Vinci Code, though they were suppressed on unreliable evidence at trial in 1307. A vivid picture of their public life in busy central London, before this, is given in a splendid new book, The Temple Church in London (Boydell Press, £40), edited by Robin Griffiths-Jones, the present Master of the Temple, and Professor David Park of the Courtauld.
It follows the fortunes of this historic enclave, from its century under Templar rule to its restoration after the heartbreaking night of May 10-11, 1941, when clergy and their wives had to watch the church burn for lack of water to extinguish the flames from incendiary bombs during the worst raid of the Blitz.
When it was built, it was known as the New Temple, for a previous church and priory had preceded it a little to the north, in Holborn. The New Temple stood between Fleet Street, the artery of London, and the Thames, its easiest thoroughfare, on the west bank of the river Fleet, now hidden underground.
As Helen Nicholson, the author of the chapter on the medieval Temple, brings out, the Templars were a trusted part of London life and lived fully open to public view. They looked after valuables for the king and for London merchants. Lawyers also began to store their records for safety here. A public way ran through the priory, from the busy river to Fleet Street.
Henry III had wanted to be buried in the Temple, and only changed his mind after he made a refoundation at Westminster Abbey, where his tomb may now be seen.
The eight 13th-century effigies of knights in the round church, damaged during the Second World War, but recorded in detail earlier, do not depict Templars. For a start, Knights Templar wore beards. They commemorate lay patrons of the Temple keen to be associated with their prayers, as King Henry had been.
The Templars had been founded to protect the Holy Places, and lived as knights under vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. From dawn to dusk, with sleep interrupted by Matins in the middle of the night, they recited the monastic hours of prayer. When ordinary monks went about
digging or illuminating manuscripts, the Templars might be checking their horses and repairing armour. In London, their duties were less military.
That the Templars retained the respect of citizens is indicated by the fact that when their last troubles came upon them, and investigating magistrates were looking for evidence against them, only one among the 17 witnesses, lay and religious, who came forward in London, had anything definite to say against them, and he apparently had a grudge against the Order because of a land dispute.
After the suppression of the Templars, the property of the Temple went to a similar order, the Hospitallers. Since they had their own priory nearby, at Clerkenwell, they let out most of the building to the lawyers who had already been storing documents there. The lawyers remain, and so, despite everything, does the church.