The medals he produces are not even proofs of the existence of a sect of Gnostics; and even if this existence could be demonstrated, these medals and these monuments being entirely foreign to the Templars, why should they be applied to them?[183]
To give an idea of the manner in which M. Hammer tries to prove, by the medals, that the Templars were Gnostics, I will cite only these upon which this savant fancies he reads the word Quinosis or Gnosis.
In the coin 80, we see, according to M. Hammer, the temple of Jerusalem with four towers; the inscription is: + S. S. SIMOONJU[prostrate d]A; but reading it the reverse way, and beginning, not by the final A, but by the prostrate d, which M. Hammer has taken for a Q, whilst other savants, who have quoted this medal, have thought it a D, he reads SSTA QUINOMIS, although there is no T in the inscription; and considering the M as a sigma reversed, M. Hammer has found Quinosis; then Qui into G, and only making a single O of the two, he obtains Gnosis; which, according to his account, reveals and proves the secret of the Gnostic Templars.
M. Hammer not only reads it backwards, but he begins by the penultimate letter, and leaves the A, after which is a + which separates the beginning of the inscription from its end. He adds a T, and supposes a Greek letter mixed with the Latin inscription; and yet, after all these changes, he cannot produce the word Gnosis.
And what prevented him from seeing in this inscription what it really is, SS. SIMON JUDA?
In the medal 99 we read in the same manner, S. Simon Vel Juda; in the 93rd, S. Simon Juda, &c. Nothing was more common in the middle ages than coins which, on one side bear the name of a saint, and on the other side the name of a city or prince.
Two of the coins upon which, instead of St. Simon and St. Jude, M. Hammer records Saint Gnostic, bear also the name of Otto, or Otto Marchio. This circumstance is embarrassing for M. Hammer; he explains it by saying that this Marquis Otho was a Gnostic, a protector of the Templars, and initiated into their secret doctrines.
Seelander only reads St. Simon and St. Jude upon these coins; he believes that this Otho might be Otho II., marquis of Brandenburg, who lived about the year 1200. If the opinion of Seelander will not induce M. Hammer to adopt this simple, natural, and evident explanation, he may find in Otto Sperlingius the explanation of a similar coin, with the inscription of St. Simon and St. Jude. The heads of the two saints are close together, under the same crown. A. Mellen thought that this coin was struck at Goslar, and Sperlengius adopts his opinion.
But even if it were allowed that these coins belonged to a sect of Gnostics, I should continue to assert that M. Hammer does not at all prove that the Templars made use of them. The reasoning of this savant is reduced almost to this:—“These monuments are Gnostic, therefore they relate to the Templars;” and to this:—“These monuments relate to the Templars, therefore they are Gnostic.”
But let me be permitted to say once more, if the Templars had had amongst them such Gnostic signs, how was it that these signs were not made known and denounced when the question was to destroy the order? How is it that they are never found anywhere but in Germany?