Did the Templars suffer a decline in popularity and donations after the Battle of La Forbie (1244)?

Nicholson, Helen ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1715-1246 2026. Did the Templars suffer a decline in popularity and donations after the Battle of La Forbie (1244)? Stantschev, Stefan K. and Weber, Benjamin, eds. Penser les croisades tardives. Diversité, modalités, postérités. Mélanges en l’honneur de Norman Housley, Croisades tardives, No. 10. Toulouse: Presses universitaires du Midi, pp. 53-64.

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Abstract

Joshua Prawer proposed that «hostile public opinion» towards the military orders (by which he meant the Templars, the Hospitallers, and the Teutonic knights) arose during the years «ca. 1239–40»: «It is at that time, and during the following generation, that the Military Orders fell into opprobrium, and an image was elaborated … of the dissensions, quarrels, even real hatred between the Military Orders, a wrath which will be presented as rocking the kingdom, a major reason for its weakness and finally its fall». The root of the problem, in Prawer’s view, was the division in the Orders’ views over the best policy to adopt towards their neighbouring Muslim polities: «the Hospitallers opted for an alliance with Egypt, the Templars for that of Damascus». The immediate result was the invasion of the kingdom by the Khwarizmians and the death of thousands of the knights, their turcopoles and their mercenaries at the battle of Gaza, also known as La Forbie, a defeat described by Peter Jackson as «as grave a catastrophe as Hattin and from which the kingdom never recovered ». So decisive was this defeat that, in the words of Ilya Berkovich: «Forbie spells the end of the Franks as an independent force not only militarily, but politically as well». The Emperor Frederick II blamed the Syrian Franks’ treaty with Damascus for the invasion and therefore the subsequent massacre, singling out Patriarch Robert for leading the rash attack on the Khwarizmians, and the Templars for welcoming the Damascene negotiators to their house in Acre. Modern historians have questioned Frederick’s interpretation of events. The question remains, however, whether contemporaries followed Frederick in blaming the Templars for the catastrophe, and hence whether it was the battle of La Forbie that destroyed the Templars’ reputation as defenders of the Holy Land and so, eventually, brought about the destruction of the order. This article reviews the evidence and points out that few Christian commentators in the second half of the thirteenth century mentioned the battle of La Forbie and therefore did not blame the Templars’ actions for the defeat. In fact, views of the Templars did not noticeably change after 1244; instead, European commentators appear to have been losing interest in and hope for the crusader states in the east.

Item Type:	Book Section
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Schools > History, Archaeology and Religion
Subjects:	D History General and Old World > D History (General) D History General and Old World > D History (General) > D111 Medieval History
Publisher:	Presses universitaires du Midi
ISBN:	9782810713653
Related URLs:	Publisher
Last Modified:	10 Jul 2026 13:45
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/188090

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