The Military Orders: Fighting for the Faith and Caring for the Sick ed. by Malcolm Barber

Abstract

The Military Orders: Fighting for Faith and Caring for Sick. Edited by Malcolm Barber. (Brookfield, Vermont:: Variorum,, Ashgate Publishing Company. 1994. Pp. xxviii, 399. $99.50.) This volume is made up of forty-one papers read at a conference on Military Orders held at St. John's Gate, Clerkenwell, London, in September, 1992. The editor, Malcolm Barber, is to be congratulated for way in which he has given to this collection a coherence rarely achieved in works of this kind. Fourteen contributions relate to Knights of St. John, eight to Templars, seven to Teutonic Order, four to Spanish Orders, while remaining eight approach topic in a more general way. Jean Richard, doyen of Crusading studies, has written an introduction to book in which he succeeds in assigning to each contribution its place in wider context of crusading history. In studies of all Orders there is a strong emphasis on regional history and this reflects a general trend in crusading studies. The volume opens with a magisterial essay by Michael Gervers about estate management of Hospitallers in Essex, and Enrique Rodriguez-Picavea Matilla has produced an impressive account of agricultural exploitation by Order of Calatrava of its estates in Tagus valley. The medical work of Orders was one of main themes of conference, and Anthony Luttrell has written an outstanding survey of hospitaller activities of Knights of St. John on Rhodes, where the sick were served their meals on silver dishes and drank from silver spoons (p. 71). Susan Edgington has contributed an interesting background paper on state of medical knowledge among first Crusaders and has drawn attention to an early example of use of animals (in this case a bear) to test efficacy of medical treatment. Archaeological evidence is of central importance in studying early history of Orders. Peter Megaw has written about castle of Paphos in Cyprus, which he has spent a lifetime excavating, and which he argues is an Hospitaller foundation closely resembling Belvoir in Galilee. Denys Pringle has produced a survey of towers on Jerusalem-Jericho road which were almost certainly built and manned by Templars for protection of pilgrims. A good deal of new light is shed on Templars by contributors to this volume. Jonathan Phillips argues cogently that their licensing as an Order at Council of Troyes in 1128 was closely linked to an attempt to launch a new crusade against Damascus. Peter Lock has found evidence that Order had a more proactive role in Fourth Crusade and setting up of Latin Empire than it is normally credited with. …