Only fragments have reached us of the vast accumulation of documents respecting the case of the Templars. In the migrations of Clement V. doubtless some were lost (Franz Ehrle, Archiv für Litt.-u. Kirchengesch. 1885, p. 7); others in the Schism, when Benedict XIII. carried a portion of the archives to Peniscola (Schottmüller, I. 705), and others again in the transport of the papers of the curia from Avignon to Rome. When, in 1810, Napoleon ordered the papal archives transferred to Paris, where they remained until 1815, the first care of General Radet, the French Inspector-general of Rome, was to secure those concerning the trials of the Templars and of Galileo (Regest. Clement. PP. V., Romæ, 1885, T. I. Proleg. p. ccxxix.). During their stay in Paris Raynouard utilized them in the work so often quoted above, but even then only a few seem to have been accessible, and of these a portion are now not to be found in the Vatican MSS., although Schottmüller, the most recent investigator, expresses a hope that the missing ones may yet be traced (op. cit. I. 713). The number of boxes sent to Paris amounted to 3239, and the papal archivists complained that many documents were not restored. The French authorities declared that the papal agents to whom they had been delivered sold immense quantities to grocers (Reg. Clem. V. Proleg. pp. ccxciii.-ccxcviii.).
[341] Bull. Vox in excelso (Van Os, pp. 72-4).—Du Puy, pp. 177-8.—Ptol. Lucens. Hist. Eccles. Lib. xxiv. (Murutori S. R. I. XI. 1236).—Raynouard, p. 187.—Cf. Raynald. ann. 1311, No. 55.
If Schottmüller’s assumption be correct as to the “Deminutio laboris examinantium processus contra ordinem Templi in Anglia,” printed by him from a Vatican MS. (op cit. II. 78 sqq.)—that it was prepared to be laid before the commission of the Council of Vienne, it shows the unscrupulous manner in which the evidence was garbled for the purpose of misleading those who were to sit in judgment. All the favorable testimony is suppressed and the wildest gossip of women and monks is seriously presented as though it were incontrovertible.
[342] Jo. Hocsemii Gest. Episcc. Leodiens. (Chapeaville, II. 345).—Baudouin, Lettres inédites de Philippe le Bel, p. 179.—Chron. Cornel. Zantfliet ann. 1307 (Martene Ampl. Coll. V. 154).—Bull. Vox in excelso (Van Os, pp. 75-77).—Bern. Guidon. Flor. Chron. (Bouquet, XXI. 721).—Wilcke, II. 307.—Gürtleri Hist. Templarior. Amstel. 1703, p. 365.—Vertot, Hist. des Chev. de Malthe, Ed. 1755, Tom II. p. 136.—Contin. Guill. Nangiac. ann. 1311-12.—Martin. Polon. Contin. (Eccard. I. 1438).—Trithem. Chron. Hirsaug. ann. 1307.
When, in 1773, Clement XIV. desired to abolish the Order of Jesuits by an arbitrary exercise of papal power, he did not fail to find a precedent in the suppression of the Templars by Clement V.—as he says in his bull of July 22, 1773, “Etiamsi concilium generale Viennense, cui negotium examinandum commiserat, a formali et definitiva sententia ferenda censuerit se abstinere.”—Bullar. Roman. Contin. Prati, 1847, V. 620.
The wits of the day did not allow the affair to pass unimproved. Bernard Gui cites as current at the time the Leonine verse, “Res est exempli destructa superbia Templi.” Hocsemius quotes for us a chronogram by P. de Awans, possibly alluding to the treasure which Philippe gained—
“Excidium Templi nimia pinguedine rempli
Ad LILIVM duo C consocianda doce.”
To minds of other temper there were not lacking portents to prove the anger of Heaven, whether at the crimes of the Order or at its destruction—eclipses of sun and moon, parahelia, paraselenæ, fires darting from earth to heaven, thunder in clear sky. Near Padua a mare dropped a foal with nine feet; flocks of birds of an unknown species were seen in Lombardy; throughout the Paduan territory a rainy winter was succeeded by a dry summer with hail-storms, so that the harvests were a failure. No Etruscan haruspex or Roman augur could wish for clearer omens: it reads like a page of Livy.—Albertini Mussati Hist. August. Rubr. X. XI. (Muratori S. R. I. X. 377-9).-Cf. Ptol. Lucens. Hist. Eccles. Lib. XXIV. (Ib. XI. 1233); Fr. Jordan. Chron. ann. 1314 (Muratori Antiq. XI. 789).
[343] Contin. Guill. Nangiac. ann. 1312.—Raynald. ann. 1312, No. 5.—Hocsemii Gest. Episcopp. Leod. (Chapeaville, II. 346).—Chron. Fr. Pipini c. 49 (Muratori S. R. I. IX. 750).—Chron. Astens. c. 27 (Ib. XI. 194).—Chron. Cornel. Zantfliet ann. 1310 (Martene Ampl. Coll. V. 160).—Walsingham (D’Argentré I. I. 280).—Raynouard, pp. 197-8.—Bull. Ad providam (Rymer, III. 323.—Mag. Bull. Rom. IX. 149.—Harduin. VII. 1341-8).—Bull. Nuper in generali (Rymer III. 326. Mag. Bull. Rom. IX. 150).—Zurita, Lib. V. c. 99.—Allart, op. cit. pp. 71-2.—Schmidt, Päbstliche Urkunden, p. 81.
[344] Bern. Guidon. Flor. Chron. (Bouquet, XXI. 722).—Godefroy de Paris, v. 6028-9.—Ferreti Vicentin. Hist. (Muratori S. R. I. IX. 1017).—Le Roulx, Documents, etc., p. 51.—Havemann, Geschichte des Ausgangs, p. 290.—Fr. Pipini Chron. c. 49 (Muratori IX. 750).—Joann. de S. Victor. (Bouquet, XXI. 658).—Vaissette, IV. 141.—Stemler, Contingent zur Geschichte der Templer, pp. 20-1.—Raynouard, pp. 213-4, 233-5.—Wilcke, II. 236, 240.—Anton, Versuch, p. 142.