Temple Church, London (London)

The Temple Church is a late 12th century church in London, built for and by the Knights Templar.

Summary

Free admission
Art and sculpture
Information provided

Introduction

The Temple Church is a late 12th century church in London located between Fleet Street and the River Thames, built for and by the Knights Templar as their English headquarters. In modern times, two Inns of Court (Inner Temple and Middle Temple) both use the church. It is famous for its effigy tombs and for being a round church. It was heavily damaged during the Second World War but has been largely restored.

Among other purposes, the structure was originally used for Templar initiation ceremonies. In England, the ceremony involved new recruits entering the Temple via the western door at dawn. The initiates would enter the circular nave, and then take monastic vows of piety, chastity, poverty and obedience. The details of initiation at the time were a closely-guarded secret, though this secrecy later caused trouble as gossip and rumours spread about possible Templar blasphemy. These suspicions were manipulated and expanded by the Order's enemies, such as King Philip IV of France.

Access for pedestrians after 20.30 on weekdays and all weekend is via Tudor Street only.

History to the present day

In the mid 12th century, before the construction of the church, the Knights Templar in London had met at a site in High Holborn in a structure originally established by Hughes de Payens (the site had been historically the location of a Roman temple in Londinium). Because of the rapid growth of the order, by the 1160s the site had become too confined, and the Order purchased the current site for the establishment of a larger monastic complex as their headquarters in England.

The church building comprises two separate sections. The original nave section, called the Round Church, and an adjoining rectangular section, built approximately half a century later, called the Chancel. In keeping with the traditions of the order, the nave of the church was constructed on a round design based on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

It was consecrated on February 10, 1185 in a ceremony by Heraclius, Patriarch of Jerusalem. It is believed that Henry II was present at the consecration.

1185–1307
The Knights Templar order was very powerful in England, with the Master of the Temple sitting in parliament as primus baro (the first baron of the realm). The compound was regularly used as a residence by kings and by legates of the Pope. The Temple also served as an early depository bank, sometimes in defiance of the Crown's wishes to seize the funds of nobles who had entrusted their wealth there.

In January 1215 William Marshall (who is buried in the nave next to his sons, under one of the 9 marble effigies of medieval knights there) served as a negotiator during a meeting in the Temple between King John and the barons, who demanded that John uphold the rights enshrined the Coronation Charter of his predecessor Richard I. William swore on behalf of the king that the grievances of the barons would be addressed in the summer, leading to John's signing of Magna Carta in June.

William later became regent during the reign of John's son, Henry III. Henry later expressed a desire to be buried in the church and so, in the early 13th century, the choir of the original church was pulled down and a new larger structure, now called the Chancel, was built. It was consecrated on Ascension Day 1240 and comprises a central aisle and two side aisles of identical width. The height of the vault is 36 feet 3 inches.

Crown seizure
After the destruction and abolition of the Knights Templar in 1307, Edward II took control of the church as a Crown possession. It was later given to the Knights Hospitaller, who rented the Temple to two colleges of lawyers. One college moved into the part of the Temple previously used by the Temple's knights, and the other into the part previously used by its priests, and they shared the use of the church. The colleges evolved into the Inner and Middle Temples, two of the four Inns of Court (the other two being Lincoln's Inn and Gray's Inn).

16th–19th centuries
The interior of the Round Church in the early 19th century.In 1540, the church became the property of The Crown once again when Henry VIII abolished the Knights Hospitaller in England and confiscated their property. Henry provided a priest for the church under the former title "Master of the Temple". In the 1580s, the church was the scene of the Battle of the Pulpits, a theological conflict between Calvinists and supporters of the Church of England. At that time, William Shakespeare also knew it and hence, in his play Henry VI, part 1, it and the Temple garden feature as the setting for the fictional scene of the plucking of two roses and the start of the 15th century Wars of the Roses. In 2002, this was commemorated with the planting of new white and red roses in the modern gardens.

The church was undamaged by the Great Fire of London in 1666. Nevertheless, it was refurbished by Christopher Wren, who made extensive modifications to the interior, including an altar screen and the introduction of an organ to the church for the first time. The church was restored again in 1841 by Smirke and Burton, who decorated the walls and ceiling in the high Victorian Gothic style, in an attempt to bring the church back to its original appearance. Further restoration work was executed by James Piers St Aubyn in 1862.

Second World War
On May 10, 1941, a German air raid of incendiary bombs set the roof of the Round Church on fire,[1] and the fire quickly spread to the nave and chapel. The organ and all the wood parts of the church, including the Victorian renovations, were destroyed and the dark Purbeck marble columns of the Chancel cracked from the intense heat. Although these columns still supported the vault, they were deemed unsound and replaced by replicas. The original columns had a light outward lean, an architectural quirk which was duplicated in the replacement columns.

Arrival information and how to find us

Address: Temple Church, London, , United Kingdom

Directions: Nearest underground stations are Temple and Blackfriars stations on the Circle and District lines.