Knights History
The Knights Templar began when a group of nine "French" knights came to Jerusalem in the year 1118 A.D. These knights petitioned the king of Jerusalem to allow them to live in the ancient Temple of Solomon, then partly a mosque and partly in ruins. French architect Louis Charpentier claims that the Knights Templar built Chartres as a repository for ancient wisdom. This repository is equal to Stonehenge, the Temple of Solomon or the Great Pyramid of Egypt. He further claims that special knowledge about the Temple in Jerusalem was gained by the founding group of nine knights who lived at Solomon’s Temple starting in 1118 A.D. In that year it is historically recorded that nine "French" knights presented themselves to a Christian King Baldwin II of Jerusalem, and explained that they planned to form themselves into a company with a plan for protecting pilgrims from robbers and murderers along the public highways leading to the holy city. They also asked to be housed within a wing of the palace, a wing that happened to be adjacent to the Dome of the Rock mosque, which was built on the site of Solomon’s Temple. The king granted their request and the Order of the Knights of Solomon’s Temple or Knights Templar was born. Ten years later the nine knights presented themselves to the Pope, who gave his official approval to the Knights Templar. Although only nine mysterious knights existed, a tenth joined them, who was the Count of Champagne, an important French noble. In fact, none of the "poor" knights was apparently poor, nor were they all French. Several came from important French and Flemish families. Of the ten original knights, four have not been identified, although their names are known. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the Knights of the Temple of Solomon were formed to protect the pilgrims to Jerusalem because such an order of knights already existed. They were the Knights Hospitallers or Knights of St. John, later to become the Knights of Malta.It is important not to confuse the Knights Templar with the Knights of Malta, as many readers, and some historians, do. The Knights Templar are quite different from the other crusaders and were sometimes said to fight in combat against each other, even in the; Holy Land .The Knights Hospitallers, which still exist today as the Knights of Malta, were forced to leave Malta by Napoleon, who stopped at the island on his way to Egypt. Today the Knights of Malta reside in Italy, still have their own sovereign country; and are said to be a secret society for the Vatican. It was commonly believed the Templars were at odds with the Vatican and their military arm, the Knights Hospitallers.