Before heaven and earth and with all of you here as my witnesses...I declare, and I must declare, that the Order is innocent. Its purity and saintliness is beyond question. from the final recorded statement by Jacques de Molay, the last Templar Grand Master, on March 18, 1314, before he was led to the stake. Who were the medieval Knights Templar? How is their name connected to Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem? What does their red cross symbolize?...

Barbara Frale gives us an explosive, exhaustively researched history of the medieval world's most powerful military order, the Templars. At its height, the Order of the Knights Templar rivaled the kingdoms of Europe in military might, economic power, and political influence. For 700 years, the tragic demise of this society of warrior-monks amid accusations of heresy has been plagued by controversy, in part because the transcript of their trial by...