The Interrogation Scroll of the Templars: An Important Historical Source

Two years ago, the French National Archives held the first in a series of exhibitions to present some of the extraordinary documents in its care. The second, called “Les Remarquables”, opened this autumn with a 22-meter/72-feet long interrogation scroll, the centerpiece of the one of the most famous legal sagas in French history. The Knights Templar trial still captures the collective imagination, yet most people don’t really know what it was all about. The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, an order founded by a handful of knights to defend the Holy Land after the First Crusade in 1095, depended on and received privileges from the Pope. For 200 years, their wealthy commanderies…