A new survey of major Templar landholdings offers fresh insights into key questions about their medieval history. Much has been written about the history of the Knights Templar, the legendary Order of military monks. Far less attention, however, has been paid to the Templar estates in Western Christendom which supported their endeavours. Set within the context of the turbulent history of medieval and Tudor England, the book follows the fate of the Templar estates in the county of Lincolnshire. Beginning with the survey of Templar property undertaken by Geoffrey FitzStephen in 1185, the story of the estates is followed through the primary sources of the estate accounts of 1307-1312, the Report of Philip de Thame of 1338, the Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1535 and the 1557 letter patent of Mary Tudor. What emerges is the previously untold tale of the characteristics of the estates, the personnel who were involved and the nature of Templar agriculture in the early fourteenth century. A number of major questions are addressed, including how Edward II dealt with the Templar estates after the arrest of the Order in 1308; whether all the Templar estates were transferred to the Hospitallers as is widely supposed; and what happened to the Hospitaller inheritance of Templar lands during the English Reformation.

"A cogent, well-written volume." - SPECULUM

"The Templar Estates in Lincolnshire makes a very substantial contribution both to our knowledge of Templar agriculture and also to the broader rural world of medieval Lincolnshire." - JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS HISTORY, LITERATURE & CULTURE

"The book is very well presented, with a comprehensive collection of maps and references, and it makes a fascinating analysis of a subject little known to the general reader." - FACHRS

"Set to stand as a valuable monograph." - Nottingham Medieval Studies