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THE TEMPLARS
IN CAMBRIDGESHIRE
PRECEPTORY OF DENNY -
Denny Abbey, near Waterbeach in Cambridgeshire, has an unusual history. Founded as a Benedictine monastery around 1159, it was transferred to the Knights Templar in about 1170, becoming a Templar preceptory. Unlike most Templar houses, however, Denny developed into a specialist establishment for aged and infirm members of the Order.
The Templar Estate
The Templars received not only the monastery but its associated lands and estates. They subsequently increased their possessions around Denny, while income from other Templar properties helped support the brethren cared for there. In particular, income from the nearby Templar establishment at Great Wilbraham and its church was assigned to the maintenance of the infirm members at Denny.
Denny therefore functioned less as a conventional military preceptory and more as a religious hospital and retirement house for Templar brethren.
The Buildings
The Templars inherited the substantial Benedictine complex and adapted it for their own use.
The existing 12th-century church was remodelled by the Templars, including the magnificent late-12th-century western doorway and carved waterleaf capitals. They also constructed a stone chamber adjoining the south-west side of the church, probably providing accommodation for the chaplain who celebrated Mass for the community.
The Templars also continued to use the earlier monastic buildings, including the dormitory and refectory, although their exact medieval arrangement is not completely understood.
The wider establishment included the agricultural and service buildings necessary to maintain the community, together with fishponds, water channels, enclosures and associated earthworks. Archaeology has demonstrated that substantial remains of the medieval precinct survive below ground.
The Templars at Denny
An inventory made following the suppression of the Order in 1308 gives a remarkable glimpse of daily life.
There were 11 beds in the dormitory, while the refectory contained little more than tables and benches. The church possessed three silver chalices, together with vestments and books required for worship. The annual income of the establishment was approximately £66.
When the Templars were arrested in 1308, eleven Templars at Denny were taken into custody at Cambridge Castle. Their names demonstrate that the community was made up of brethren who had come from different parts of England and Scotland; at least one had entered the Order in Syria, showing that Denny's residents included men with direct experience of the Crusades.
Denny was therefore home not simply to a handful of local estate administrators, but to a community of Templar brothers, including elderly and infirm former members of the Order.
The End of the Templars
Following the suppression of the Knights Templar, Denny passed formally to the Knights Hospitaller, although they did not make substantial use of the property. In 1324 it reverted to the Crown.
In 1337 the site was granted to Mary de Valence, Countess of Pembroke, who later transferred the Franciscan nuns known as the Poor Clares from Waterbeach to Denny. They transformed the former Templar complex and occupied it until the Dissolution in 1539.
What Survives Today?
Denny is exceptionally important because substantial parts of the medieval complex survive.
The standing remains include the 12th-century church, substantially remodelled during the Templar occupation, and the medieval refectory. Archaeological remains of other buildings and features survive beneath the ground, including parts of the wider monastic precinct, ancillary buildings, boundaries and fishponds.
The later Franciscan alterations mean that the site seen today represents several centuries of history, but within the surviving buildings it is still possible to see the fabric of the Templar establishment of the late 12th and 13th centuries.
Denny is therefore one of England's most important surviving Templar sites — not because it was a great military headquarters, but because it provides an unusually intimate glimpse of how the Order cared for its aged, sick and retired brethren
CAMBRIDGE KNIGHTS HOSPITALLER MAP
PRECEPTORY GREAT WILBRAHAM
Great Wilbraham, east of Cambridge, was home to a Knights Templar preceptory from the later 12th century until the suppression of the Order in 1308. The Templars held the manor, agricultural land and the church, establishing a small religious and administrative centre at what became known as Temple End.
The Templar Estate
The Templars' first connection with Wilbraham appears to have developed in the 12th century, when the church was transferred to their possession through the monks of Denny. A papal confirmation of the 1170s confirms the Templars' possession of Wilbraham Church.
The major expansion of their estate came in 1226, when Peter Malauney (Peter de Malo Alneto) granted all his lands at Wilbraham to Alan Martel, Master of the Temple in England, giving the Templars the manor itself. A Pipe Roll entry of 1237 records lands at Wilbraham belonging to the Templars.
The estate included the manor house, agricultural land and the parish church, together forming a small Templar agricultural and administrative establishment.
The Preceptory
The preceptory was a relatively small establishment rather than one of the great Templar houses such as Temple Bruer or Denny.
By 1308, records describe the establishment at Wilbraham as consisting of a small manor house and a chapel, with relatively simple furnishings. The Templars managed the estate and employed local people to work the surrounding lands.
The exact medieval layout is no longer certain, but the complex would have included the principal manor or residential building, a chapel, agricultural buildings and the working elements required to administer the estate.
The present Wilbraham Temple stands on or close to the site of the medieval manor. The existing house dates principally from the early 17th century, so it should not be mistaken for the surviving Templar manor itself.
The Church
The Templars' association with the parish church is particularly important.
The present St Nicholas' Church incorporates substantial medieval fabric. Part of the north wall of the nave is thought to survive from the 12th-century church, including a small Norman window discovered during restoration in 1893. During the Templars' period, the church underwent substantial rebuilding in the 13th century, including the addition of lancet windows and the development of its cruciform plan.
The evidence therefore supports a strong Templar role in the rebuilding of the medieval church, although the earlier church clearly pre-dated the Templars.
Templars at Wilbraham
The records surrounding the suppression of the Order provide names of brothers associated with Wilbraham.
Richard Peytevyn, recorded as commander of Wilbraham, was arrested in 1308. He had entered the Order at Dinsley in 1266.
Two other brothers associated with Wilbraham were:
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William de Thorp, described as custos (custodian)
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William Raven, a Templar brother
Both were arrested following the suppression of the Order in 1308. William Raven was later questioned about his admission to the Templars.
The surviving records also identify John, vicar of Wilbraham, among those associated with the Templars' estate in 1308. He was presumably responsible for the parish church rather than being a member of the Order.
Thus the preceptory was not occupied solely by knights: it formed part of a wider community of Templar brothers, clergy, estate officials and local agricultural workers.
The End of the Templars
On 10 January 1308, the Templars' English estates were seized following the arrest of the brothers. Wilbraham subsequently passed to the Knights Hospitaller, who inherited the Templars' property in 1313.
The Hospitallers retained the Wilbraham estate and its ecclesiastical patronage for much of the following two centuries.
What Survives Today?
Although the medieval preceptory itself has disappeared, several important reminders survive:
Wilbraham Temple – the present house stands on or near the site of the Templar manor and preserves the name of the medieval establishment. Historic England recognises the site as being associated with the former Templar manor.
The former medieval solar wing – a late-15th-century timber-framed building survives beside Wilbraham Temple. It belonged to the later Hospitaller manor but occupies part of the medieval religious-estate complex inherited from the Templars.
St Nicholas' Church – the church contains surviving 12th- and 13th-century fabric from the period of Templar ownership and rebuilding.
Together, these buildings and the surviving name Temple End/Wilbraham Temple preserve the memory of one of the smaller but genuine Templar preceptories of medieval Cambridgeshire.
PRECEPTORY OF DUXFORD
Duxford, or Dokesworth as it was known in the Middle Ages, was home to a small but genuine Knights Templar preceptory in Cambridgeshire. The Templars held a substantial manor here, with agricultural land, mills, a chapel and a residential and administrative complex.
The Templar Estate
The Templar estate originated with the powerful de Colville family. Before his death in about 1230, William de Colville granted two carucates of land and a mill at Duxford to the Knights Templar. Two carucates represented approximately 240 acres, although the precise extent of the medieval holding varied over time.
The Colvilles retained the overlordship of the manor, while the Templars developed their holding into an estate centre. By 1279, the Templar preceptor held more than four hides in demesne. The earliest surviving documentary reference to the Duxford preceptory itself is from 1273, when the Master of the Temple granted a lease whose rent was payable to the house at Duxworth.
The estate included agricultural land and watermills, providing both food and income for the preceptory.
The Preceptory Buildings
The Templar establishment stood near the River Cam, in the area later known as Temple Farm and Temple Close. Archaeological and documentary evidence indicates that the complex was enclosed, with traces of a rectangular medieval moat surviving in the landscape.
The 1308 inventory gives an unusually useful glimpse of the buildings. The preceptory contained:
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a hall
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a chamber
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a buttery
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a bakehouse
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a chapel
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agricultural and service buildings associated with the manor
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mills serving the estate.
The buildings were relatively modest compared with the great Templar preceptories. At the time of the suppression there appears to have been only one furnished chamber and a single bed, suggesting that Duxford was primarily an estate-management centre rather than a large residential community.
The Templar Chapel — and the Hospital Chapel
An important distinction must be made between two medieval religious establishments at Duxford.
The Templars had a chapel within their own preceptory, whose books and liturgical furnishings were inventoried when the Order was suppressed in 1308. These included a missal, antiphonal, two-volume legenda, psalter, gradual and troper with ordinal.
Nearby, at Whittlesford Bridge, William de Colville had founded a completely separate Hospital of St John in the early 13th century. Its surviving chapel, now known as Duxford Chapel, is therefore not the Templar preceptory chapel. English Heritage confirms that the chapel belonged to the hospital and that its precise relationship with the hospital buildings remains uncertain.
The Templars at Duxford
The best-recorded Templar at Duxford was Brother John de Moun (John de Mohun), who served as preceptor of Duxford.
By the time of the suppression in January 1308, John had been associated with the Order for approximately 38 years. He was arrested and later imprisoned at Crepelgate in London, where he was recorded as the preceptor of Dokesworth.
The 1308 evidence indicates that the preceptory also supported a substantial group of lay servants, including farmers and farm labourers, a cook, porter, groom and John de Moun's personal servant. Around 15 servants were associated with the establishment, although they probably did not all live inside the preceptory itself.
Another Templar associated with Duxford was Robert the Scot, who is recorded at both Duxford and Denny.
The End of the Preceptory
The Duxford estate was seized when the Templars were suppressed on 10 January 1308. In June 1309 it was placed in the custody of Roger de Wingfield, who administered the former Templar estates in Cambridgeshire and Oxfordshire.
In 1313, the former Duxford Templar property was transferred to the Knights Hospitaller. By 1333 the Hospitallers were in possession, and Duxford Temple became a dependency of their preceptory at Shingay.
What Survives Today?
Very little of the Templar preceptory survives above ground. The later Temple Farm occupies the area of the former Templar estate, while the name Temple Close preserves the memory of the medieval establishment. Archaeological remains, including traces of the rectangular moat, help identify the former site of the preceptory.
The surviving Duxford Chapel at Whittlesford Bridge, although frequently associated with the Templars, belongs to the separate Hospital of St John and should not be described as the Templars' chapel.
Duxford nevertheless remains an important Templar site: beneath the modern landscape was a small medieval religious estate containing a manor, chapel, hall, domestic rooms, bakehouse, buttery, mills and agricultural land, administered by the Templars for more than half a century before the Order's suppression.
Cambridge Castle
Linked to the Knights Templars, as this is where the Knights, and Brothers at locations in Cambridgeshire were inprisoned and held at the castles Prison. Records show there were 15 Brothers arrested from Denny (listed Below) with at least on dying whilst held there, 1 from Wilbraham & 2 from Duxford (Listed Below)
Nothing remains of the castle today, other than the original Mount - However the position of the Original prison is visable
Cambridge Round Church
Elmeney
Little Shelford
Royston Cave
Ashley Cum Silverley
DUXFORD - St Johns Church
LITTLE GIDDING - St Johns Church
Little Gidding, in Huntingdonshire, has a remarkably well-documented connection with the Knights Templar. In 1185 the Order held the church of Gedinges, together with a small parcel of land in the settlement. The evidence places Little Gidding within the Templars' Bailiwick of Ogerstan, an administrative network of estates spread across Huntingdonshire and Northamptonshire.
The Gift of Maud Engaine
The Templar connection dates to 1185, when Maud (Matilda) Engaine, of the powerful Engaine family who held the Gidding estates, gave the church at Little Gidding to the Knights Templar.
The 1185 Inquest records:
De Ecclesia de Gedinges nichil que est de dono Matillis Engane.
This means:
“From the church of Gedinges, nothing, which is the gift of Matilda Engane.”
The word nichil records that the church was producing no income for the Templars at the time of the inquiry. The gift was nevertheless an important ecclesiastical possession of the Order. The surviving history of Little Gidding identifies this Gedinges with Little Gidding.
Land at Gedinges
The Templars also held a small rural property at Gedinges. The same 1185 survey records:
In Gedinges. Ex dono Warneri Dainggaines, Willelmus j. toftum, et iij. acras pro xij.d.
In translation:
“At Gedinges. From the gift of Warner Engaine, William holds one toft and three acres, for 12 pence.”
A toft was a house plot with its associated yard or buildings. This was therefore an occupied rural holding rather than simply an empty parcel of farmland.
The two entries demonstrate that the Templars possessed both an ecclesiastical interest and a small landed holding at Gedinges.
The Church and Templar Patronage
The Templars' connection with St John's continued beyond the original gift. The surviving list of medieval rectors records Brother Robert de Saumford, Master of the Knights Templar, as patron in 1238, and the Master of the Knights Templar again as patron in 1276. This provides direct evidence that the Order continued to exercise patronage over the church during the 13th century.
The church therefore had a connection with the senior administration of the English Templars, even though there is no evidence that a permanent community of Templar knights lived at Little Gidding.
Who Was There?
Unlike major Templar preceptories such as Temple Bruer or Denny, no resident community of Templar brothers is recorded at Little Gidding.
The 1185 survey does, however, name William, who occupied the Templar toft and three acres granted by Warner Engaine. He was a local tenant rather than a Templar brother.
The Templar interest in Little Gidding appears to have been administered through the wider Bailiwick of Ogerstan, rather than by a separate resident preceptor.
What Buildings Were There?
There is no evidence for a separate Templar preceptory or manor house at Little Gidding.
The principal Templar building was the parish church, and the Order's other holding consisted of the small tenanted toft and three acres.
The medieval church itself subsequently deteriorated. By the early 17th century it was in poor condition when Nicholas Ferrar and his family restored it in about 1625. The present building was substantially rebuilt in 1714 and restored again in 1853.
The End of the Templar Connection
When the Knights Templar were suppressed in England in the early 14th century, their ecclesiastical possessions passed to the Knights Hospitaller. The patronage of Little Gidding subsequently appears in the hands of the Hospitallers; the medieval list of rectors records the Prior of the Hospitallers as patron from 1335 and again in 1348, with later Hospitaller patrons also recorded.
What Survives Today?
The greatest surviving reminder of the Templars is St John the Evangelist's Church, Little Gidding.
Although the present building is largely the result of the Ferrar restoration, the 1714 rebuilding and later alterations, it occupies the site of the medieval church that belonged to the Templars. It is a Grade I listed building at approximately TL 12704 81631.
Inside the church, an inscription above the chancel arch reads:
“O pray for the peace of Jerusalem”
The church's own interpretation specifically connects this inscription with its early history under the Knights Templar and Knights Hospitaller.
Today, Little Gidding is perhaps best known through Nicholas Ferrar and T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets, but beneath that later history lies an earlier chapter: for centuries before the Ferrars arrived, this quiet Cambridgeshire church was part of the ecclesiastical estate of the Knights Templar.
CARLETON
TEMPLAR FIGURES AT CAMBRIDGE
Knights Templar at Cambridge
Brothers Arrested in Cambridgeshire
- William de la Ford - Denny Preceptor - 42 Years Service
- John de Moun - Preceptor of Duxford - 38 Years Service
- William de Chesterton - Infirm Denny - 30 Years Service
- Alexander de Bolbeck - Denny - 30 Years Service
- William de Scotho - Denny - 28 Years Service
- William de Welles - Denny - 26 Years Service
- Robert the Scot - Denny - 26 Years Service
- John de Newent - Denny - 8 Years Service
- William de Thorp - Denny - 7 Years Service
- William Raven - Denny - 5 Years Service
- Roger Dalton - Denny - 4 Years Service
- William de Marringe - Denny - Died in Cambridge Castle
- Roger de Ludlow - Denny - died before testifying
- John de Hanville - Denny - died before testifying
- John de Hauteville - Denny - Insane
- Win Raven - Wilbraham - 5 Years Service