Dott.ssa Patrizia Pepe
laureata in Accademia belle arti ramo decorazioni
RESPONSABILE U.O.S UFFICIO BENI CULTURALI
COMUNE DI CANICATTI'

To be able to make an accurate description, of the Templari, it is opportune to mention to the period and the motives, that have given life to this order, that can define him a movement of liberation and guardianship of the Christian places. We are around the year 1086, that is when in Europe the Turkish troops commanded by the prince Ortek, enter Jerusalem devastating churches, massacring priests and even taking imprisoned the patriarch. The Christian population rises up, to this whole fool with dismay, trying to bring the sacred places to the serenity and the normal daily life. It was not the first time that this happened; the sacred places had been for a long time object of assaults and robberies. For about four centuries the Moslems governed these places, and even if among thousand problems of various kind and assaults to she asked her, life regularly continued. The situation fell around the year 1000, when Syria and Palestine, definitely fell in hand of the Turkish-SELGIUCIDI, a wild and cruel population coming from the steppes of the TURKESTAN. Since then the trips in Earth Saint they became impossible; who risked to reach it, it was object of assaults and oppressions risking even the life,; for the resident Christians in Palestine, the situation was difficult even more. Jerusalem was ransacked quite a lot times, done what finally shaken the minds, since it put in evidence the problem of the sacred places for all the Christianity. he could not be stayed impassive in front of this huge destruction, that deprived the Christians of the possibility of prayer. To put an end remedy to these infamous actions, in 1095, to Piacenza a Council was held, in which, it was established that all the Christians had to unite themselves with the purpose to organize a consignment in Earth Saint, to regain the sacred places. A few months later in France, precisely to the Council of Clemort, the Pope Urbano II°, tried to repeat the invitation launching an appeal to the most greater French vassals. Very soon, after this appeal, France stirred sticking to the movement of liberation, that spread well soon in the whole Europe; all of this was possible because France possessed an own cavalry, that to the ardor of the conquest, it put from now on the religious sense. These "Soldiers" they had as sign of recognition a Red Cross on the breast and a smaller on the right shoulder; from this they took the name of Crusaders as Crusades, they had called the battles from them fought for freeing the sacred places from the heretics and infidels. These battles, were also kindly gatherings from the nobility, since they saw in them from a side the way to put their chivalrous and warlike ideal into practice, from the other, he offered him them the possibility to go out of the state of poverty in which they poured, determined by the feudalism. To those people which were ready to depart, the Church, over the apostolic benediction, the suspension, granted at times the remission of the debts. You incite from these promises, thousand of people, united him to form the army of the Christianity. 

THE FIRST CRUSADE 
The Turks committed a lot of slaughters, in fact he succeeded in being saved only himself a part of cruciform army. Subsequently also the noble united him in army, driven by Goffredo of Buglione, from the Prince Boemondo from Taranto and from Baldovino of Fiandra, with around 100.000 men. Anywhere it entered, this army, left some traces as the institution of Christian principalities, to preserve and to guarantee the independence from the Arabic overcomings. In the year 1099, precisely on June 3, the Christian army enters Jerusalem, exactly after three years from the departure, three long years during which they were not missed defections. Comes in Jerusalem, city Saint, the enthusiasm was recomposed. After one month of struggles, in which commiserated a real massacre, them same had to be ashamed, they surrendered to the feet of the Saint Sepulchre in prayer and they remained much longer you. To defend the city from the Turkish attacks, the Crusaders, they decided to constitute the City in the surrounding territory submitting the guide of it to the most representative commander of the consignment Goffredo of Buglione. It was born so the frank kingdom, a strip of earth between sea and desert, that, even if in unstable position it lasted for about two centuries. You looked for in every way of attracting the Christians of the surrounding countries, in the new kingdom; the region had solidified with fortitudes in which the populations, nevertheless, were in continuous state of siege, while the countries were always nanny of the Saracens. One of the most greater problems that had to face the army were the lack of strengths and a halves to defend themselves from the hostile attacks. To obviate to this situation, the first institution was created, that of the Chivalrous ones, destined to have a lot of succession. They were monastic orders, that further to acquit the religious and ecclesiastical duties, defended with the weapons and they escorted the populations that were brought in Earth Saint. Two were particularly the chivalrous orders of first floor, for the defense of the Saint Sepulchre: that of the TEMPLARI or Riders Of the Temple and that of the GIOVANNITI or Hospital. The first order, that of the Templari, whose name derived from the fact that the central center was found in Jerusalem, on the place where he/she believed him the temple of Salomone it existed, and it had been founded by a noble of the Champagne, Ugo of Peyens, and it understood people of all the social classes. The riders of the Temple reached a position of great power, thanks to the interest of St. Bernard, that actively used him to publicize the new order, that came to have rich possessiones with the time.  All of this didn't serve to the maintenance of the ideal that they had presided the foundation of the order, in fact, as in every historical period, they became the abuses of power and the struggles common for the supremacy, so much that after some years the order was dissolved. The second chivalrous order, that of the Giovanniti or Hospital, so called from the hospital in Jerusalem, devoted to St. Giovanni Battista, it had the same fate. It had been born with the purpose to assist the pilgrims, but it immediately became rich and powerful, putting in the foreground the action of the predominance. The order Giovannita as that of the Templari, had as sign of recognition a cross, but while in the Templari the mantle was white with a red cross, in the Giovanniti the mantle was black with a white cross, and in battle they used a red caress with the white cross. Despite all the finished efforts, it spent little time from the institution of the chivalrous orders of the Templari and the Giovanniti, that the Earth Saint fell in Turkish hand. Beginning from the XII° century, the popes, were forced to live in a seeds exile, to escape the traps of the principles and the emperors.  

The French politics arrives to add other problems with the intent to absorb the papacy within his own spheres.  
Pope Bonifacio VIII° tried to maintain an attitude how much firmer possible towards Phillip the Beautiful one, coming up to the excommunication; but then his successor Pope Benedetto XI°, Dominican monk, very mild, you had looked for in all the ways a conciliation, removing the excommunication from Phillip and attenuating the decisions that Pope Bonifacio VIII° had taken in his comparisons, guilty to have participated in the attack of Anagni, precisely when Phillip made to arrest and to submit a French bishop to trial, guilty of tall betrayal subsequently to some declarations of his. All of this was also possible because the king, was sure of the unconditional support of the French people, that had been wanting the independence for so much time and to become a free state without external influences, not even that papal, affirming that the pope didn't have any power on the imperial matters. From his song, Bonifacio VIII°, was not the type to leave to race abdicating his ideal. Practically the was being born is modern autonomous from every power, even from that ecclesiastical. In fact in 1302, in a bead, he affirmed "The Principle Of the Two Swords", with which was specified that spiritual power had the authority to found the temporal power, and in, the same time to declare heretical whoever sustained the contrary one. Phillip the Beautiful one was extremely violent. It immediately declared, publicly, that the pontiff was heretical and guilty of the killing of his predecessor, asking the convocation of an extraordinary council so that he judged him. These altercations lasted up to the eve of the excommunication: Bonifacio VIII° was open in his summer of Anagni and a group of soldiers, made by the Column available, it treated it bad, as a simple prisoner and he was slapped even by one of the Column. Pope Bonifacio VIII°, being a pope a lot of good person, he didn't succeed in showing his innocence, gives the wickedness of Phillip the Beautiful one. After a few days the population of Anagni rose up: he succeeded in freeing the pontiff, sick and very embittered, for the suffered injustice, that died two months later, leaving the papacy in the hands of the French diplomacy. The application of an extraordinary council to the memory, to judge Bonifacio VIII°, the same was gotten by Phillip the Beautiful one from Pope Clemente V°, but the most serious thing was that the king suppressed the order of the Templari, done it aroused a lot of impression, not only for the suppression of the order, but mainly for the way according to which the operation was performed. it reached you the torture so that the Riders of the Temple confessed the affiliation to the order. Another aspect that must not be underestimated, it was the envy in to see the whole patrimony that you/they had accumulated during the years and their power to the warlike goals. 
Pope Clemente V°, extinguished him a few years later, with the desire to see united the people, and with a sense of guilt, that not to have known how to put of accord the children of a same God!   

Bibliography: 
The Great Religions (Rizzoli)