DEVELOPMENT OF THE ORDERS OF KNIGHTHOOD
The first orders of knighthood were radically of a religious nature inasmuch as they pursued a religious purpose and were organized like other religious communities. The order of knighthood was composed of a body of knights, united by some common objective as the care of the sick or the defense of the Catholic faith, and who were pledged with the vows of obedience, poverty and chastity, led a community life under a chosen head and professed a common rule approved by the ecclesiastical authorities.
The birthplace of all orders of knighthood was the Holy Land and they appeared during the period of the Crusades. True, some historians attempt to date the origin of the military orders as far back in antiquity as possible, for instance, to Charlemagne and his paladins or to Constantine the Great and his mother, Saint Helena. The claims of such ancestry fanatics to the contrary notwithstanding, it can safely be said that no military order of knighthood, either regular or secular, came into existence before the first Crusade, as the Bollandist Papebrock said in 1738: “Fallunt aut volentes falluntur adulatores studio placendi abrepti, quicumque militarium religionum principia ante XII saeculum requirunt” (AA. SS. Boll., Apr., III, 155).
The Holy Land was the scene of the rise of three types of religious orders. Some were orders of charity, or hospital orders, dedicating themselves to the care of the poor and sick pilgrims who came to visit the holy places. The oldest and most famous was the Order of Saint Lazarus which was functioning even before the Crusades began. Its scope was the care of lepers; moreover, lepers could become members of the congregation, and it has been alleged that during a period of its existence the grand master was chosen from among these sorely afflicted members. The confraternity always remained primarily an order of charity. The fact that the brothers admitted some knights stricken with leprosy who gave aid to the crusaders, particularly during the siege of Acre, when the common cause demanded everybody’s efforts, is certainly not sufficient reason to call the congregation of Saint Lazarus a military order of knighthood. Nonetheless, many centuries after their expulsion from the Holy Land, the remnants of this congregation were absorbed into a military order, as we shall see hereafter.
A second group of religious orders founded in the Holy Land had an exclusively military objective, inasmuch as their purpose was to protect the pilgrims against the attacks of the Moslems and to defend the cause of the Cross. The prototype of such knightly societies was the Order of the Temple.
The third type of religious order in Palestine was of a mixed character, combining works of charity with military service. The most illustrious examples of this group were the Order of Saint John in Jerusalem and the Teutonic Order.
Due to their predominant military character, only the last two groups are orders of knighthood in the strict sense of the word. Their members combined the seemingly contrasting qualities of soldiers and monks, of “militia” and “religio.” Being a “religio” such orders needed ecclesiastical approbation, but as a “religio militaris” they needed special authorization from the Holy See which alone could give religious persons permission “hostem ferire sine culpa,” “blamelessly to strike the enemy.”[2]
The orders founded in the Holy Land during the Crusades were the original military orders. The pattern of the military orders founded in the Holy Land during the Crusades was subsequently copied in various countries of Europe. We may distinguish several groups which show an ever increasing secular element and a decrease of ecclesiastical ties. Of each group only a few examples can be cited, omitting those of lesser significance.
The most faithful imitators of the original orders are the military orders set up in the Iberian Peninsula. Although founded by the kings of Spain and Portugal and used by them for their own purposes, these orders were directly dependent on the Holy See at first. Only later, when the sovereigns took over the grandmastership and made it hereditary in their family, did they lose their independence, without, however, abandoning their religious character.
The principal military orders in Italy came into existence at a rather late date in history, on or after 1500, a date traditionally accepted as marking the end of the age of chivalry. With the grand mastership vested in the crown, these Italian orders harbored the same cause for deterioration as eventually appeared in the Spanish orders, because they were dynastic orders from the start. Nonetheless, the Italian military orders greatly resembled the original ones, both in objective and organization. They aspired to the protection of the Italian coastline against the Moslem pirates from the Barbary States in North Africa who at the time were infesting the Mediterranean; they harassed the merchant marine and sporadically attacked harbors and towns along the coast. The objective of these orders, then, was much the same as that of the Order of Malta at that time, namely sea-warfare against Islam. Such an organization was the Order of Saint Stephen, established in 1562 by Cosimo I, Grand Duke of Tuscany, with the approval of the Holy Father. The knights of this order which had headquarters at Pisa cleared the Mediterranean of corsairs and took an active part in the battle of Lepanto. Eventually, however, it disintegrated, became completely secularized and survived as an order of merit.
The Order of Saint Maurice and Lazarus, founded in 1572 by Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoia, has an intriguing history. Comparatively late in origin, it was a merger of two pre-existing institutions which date back to much earlier times.
One was the hospital congregation of Saint Lazarus, previously mentioned. After the fall of Acre the fraternity was transferred to Europe and for some time flourished in France. The Italian branch soon declined and was finally suppressed by Pope Innocent VIII in 1490. There remained, however, the possessions of the order and these were handed over to certain gentlemen who, far from having an interest in lepers, did little else but appropriate the revenues for their own use.
The second institution was the so-called Order of Saint Maurice which, if it was an order at all, hardly merited the name of a military order by any stretch of the imagination. Yet whatever it lacked of the military spirit has since been largely supplied by romance, insofar as it was involved in the story of a layman who became antipope. When Amadeus VIII, Duke of Savoia, renounced the throne, he retired to Ripaglia where he had built a church in honor of the holy martyr Maurice to whom the house of Savoia had a special devotion. There, in 1434, the duke with five other knights established the Sacred Militia of Saint Maurice—a rather pompous title for a group of elderly widowers who had retired into a hermitage.
Four years later, the remnants of the Council of Basle revolted against the legitimate Pope Eugene IV and elected the above-mentioned Amadeus. He accepted under the title of Felix V and abandoned his solitude in Ripaglia in the company of the other knightly widowers. Thenceforth history has little to tell about the Sacred Militia of Saint Maurice. In 1572, Emmanuel Philibert, after lengthy negotiations, obtained from Pope Gregory XIII permission to allot the possessions of the Order of Saint Lazarus in his territory to the languishing Order of Saint Maurice. Out of this merger developed the military religious Order of Saint Maurice and Lazarus—the last of the military orders to come into existence. Its objective was to curtail piracy on the high seas and combat the enemies of the faith. However, the institution from its very inception was an affair of the Savoian dynasty, the duke and his successors assuming the office of grand master. The knights vowed obedience to the duke and were subject to him not only as vassals but also by virtue of a religious vow. They pledged themselves to serve in the convents of the order for five years; one of these convents was in Turin for the ground forces and the other in Nice for the naval forces. The character of the Order of St. Maurice and Lazarus was completely changed when Victor Emmanuel II, in 1860, made it a simple order of merit.
Other dynastic orders of knighthood having some ties with the Church were quite different. The motives for establishing them were various. Some owed their origin simply to a chance occasion or a romantic event not infrequently of a frivolous nature; some were commemorative of a signal victory in battle or the accession of a prince to the throne. Often enough, politics played a role, when a sovereign would wish to bind his nobles closer to the crown.
By way of example, we shall mention here some of the more illustrious dynastic orders of knighthood.
The Supreme Order of the Annunciation was set up in 1364 by Amadeus VI, Count of Savoia, during a tournament which was held to celebrate the victory of Savoia over a rival, the Marquis of Salusso. It would seem that similar brotherhoods in arms had existed at the Savoyard court under such romantic titles as the Round Table of the Black Swan, of the Green Knights, and the like, but the new order was to achieve a permanent character. At first, the objective of the newly organized group was only fun and love, as evidenced by the love symbols that decorated the collar of the knights. For that reason the brotherhood was dubbed the Order of the Collar. A year later when Count Amadeus made a trip to Constantinople and came in touch with the then extant religious military orders, he dedicated the fraternity to the Blessed Virgin. The religious element was heightened in the symbolic figure of fifteen knights, representing the fifteen mysteries of Our Lady. When the knights themselves had no time to say many prayers, they were quite satisfied to find a convenient substitute for their religious obligations in the persons of fifteen Carthusian monks at the Chapter House of Pierre Chatal. The latter became the seat of the order. Their first and last duty was to honor and serve faithfully their sovereign, the count, and provide him with material benefits. Such privileges as exemptions from taxes, a seat in the senate, and financial support from the crown in case of necessity were given in return to the knights. In 1518 Duke Charles III attached to the knight’s collar a medal representing the Annunciation of Our Lady, and from that time the fraternity became known as the Order of the Collar and the Annunciation. Moreover, the duke augmented the enrollment with five more knights, in honor of the five wounds of Christ.
In 1869, Victor Emmanuel II, who was soon to become King of a united Italy, changed the character of the order; it was to be simply a means of rewarding a restricted number of persons for outstanding services to the dynasty or the state.
The Order of the Golden Fleece was founded by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, in 1429, on the occasion of his marriage with the Infanta Isabella of Portugal at Bruges in the Netherlands. Pope Eugene IV gave approval in 1433 as did also Leo X in 1516. Of course, the origin and the name enjoy the aura of the usual legends, one of which is that the duke wished to commemorate the golden hair of Mary of Rumbrugge with whom he was supposed to be in love. If such is true, the order was certainly a peculiar wedding gift for his legitimate wife. The knights, who numbered thirty-one, were staunchly organized, and the order soon achieved great fame and was reputed to embody the very spirit of chivalry. The Dukes of Burgundy and their successors acted as grand masters. Eventually, it became an order of merit divided into two branches, one under the jurisdiction of the Austrian Hapsburgs and the other under the jurisdiction of the Spanish Bourbons. With the overthrow of both of these houses the order is in abeyance.
The French King Louis XI founded the Order of Saint Michael in 1469. After having fallen into disrepute, because it took in all kinds of members, its decoration was dubbed “le collier à toutes bêtes—the collar to fit every animal.” The Order of the Holy Ghost replaced it in 1573 under King Henry III. The investiture of the knights was ritualized with pompous religious ceremonies.[3]
The foregoing examples emphasize the fact that these and similar knightly fraternities were not without certain religious features. The brotherhood was placed under the protection of a patron saint; it might receive papal approbation; the meeting place of the knights included a chapel; and the gatherings of the knights as well as the initiation of a new member were graced with religious rites. The rule of these societies imposed upon their members a virtuous life, as was fitting for a true knight, such as the devotion to the Holy Spirit or the Blessed Virgin. Sometimes the statutes exhorted the members to attend daily Mass, and prescribed the reception of the sacraments twice or three times a year as well as the daily recitation of a part of the divine office. However, the dynastic orders of knighthood were different in character from the original military orders, with little of “religio” and still less of “militia.” Despite some religious features, the members did not take the canonical vows, except the oath of fidelity to the crown, neither did they live in common. Their military exploits, too, were quite insignificant in comparison with those of the Templars or the Hospitallers. When these knights fought at all, they did so not in a body, but rather as individuals. The very exclusiveness of the Golden Fleece (thirty-one knights) or the Annunziata Order (fifteen and later twenty knights) excluded all large scale feats. Besides, the objective of their military activities was not the defense of the faith, but the conquest of any enemy with whom their sovereign might become embroiled.
Further development of almost all orders of knighthood is one of monotonous regularity. Those which did not become extinct were completely secularized, some during the course of the Reformation and others during the French Revolution. The latter abolished all orders of knighthood in France, but in 1802 Napoleon re-established an order of knighthood—that of the Legion of Honor. It was merely an order of merit, and served as a model not only for the newer but also reverted upon the older still existing orders.
A few orders of knighthood did not become reduced to mere orders of merit and did retain a link with the Church. These include the Order of Malta, that of the Teutonic Knights, the Holy Sepulchre, and the Iberian military orders, which will be the subject of the subsequent articles.