He was the second highest leader of the knights Templar in the last years of the order’s existence. He was also the visitor of the temple in France and the deputy of the Grandmaster. He however was opposed the election of James Molay as Grandmaster. Hugh was arrested alongside 16 others in Poiters while waiting to see the Pope. Hugh was taken to Chinon where he was interrogated . Unlike most of the others, he made a more detailed confession than everyone else although it was contradictory.[1]
The templars including Hugh were arrested on three main grounds. One was that on entering the order the ”novitiate” had to deny christ and spit on his cross three times. After this, he had to take off his clothing and get kissed by the receptor on the lower spine, the navel and the mouth. After this, he was called to partake in homosexual acts and the last ground was that the templars worshipped false idols. [2].
In his confession, Hugh said he was received into the order by his father Humbert de Paraud as an 18 year old. He claimed he was taken aside by a one brother John that was later to become Preceptor of La Muce. He claimed he was forced into denouncing Christ but refused to ‘’spit.’’ He further stated that he presided at initiations more than any other. He confessed he made the initiates kiss him at the bottom of his back, navel and mouth. He told them they should forego women and should quench their lust with one another.[ibid]
He however claimed that despite these instructions, he did not know of any cases of sodomy within the order apart from the two or three brothers who had been imprisoned for it in the Pilgrims Castle.[ibid]
He further stated in his confession that he had been shown the head by Preceptor Peter Alemandin in Montpeiller. He claimed he only participated because they were traditions of the order and wished the errors could be done away with.[ibid]
This testimony seemed utterly false considering it was Hugh that had introduced the kisses to the body to the rite of reception himself. Something else that made this confession seem false is that if Hugh disapproved, he was as well placed as anyone to put a top to it.[ibid]
In the end, Hugh was sentenced to life imprisonment alongside Geoffroi de Gonneville who was the Preceptor of Aquitaine in 1314. He was not burned at the stake like James Molay because he accepted his sentence in silence.[ibid]
Significance: Hugh was the second highest leader of the Knights Templar in the last years of order’s existence
Works cited
1. Napier, Gordon. A to Z of the Knights Templar: a guide to their history and legacy. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Spellmount, 2008.
2.Barber, Malcom. “Propaganda in the Middle Ages: The Charges against the Templars.” Nottingham Medieval Studies. Accessed March 26, 2018. https://www.brepolsonline.net/doi/abs/10.1484/J.NMS.3.61?journalCode=nms
Bibliography
Perkins, Clarence. “The Trial of the Knights Templars in England.” The English Historical Review 24, no. 95 (1909): 432-47. http://www.jstor.org/stable/550361.
Menache, Sophia. “The Templar Order: A Failed Ideal?” The Catholic Historical Review 79, no. 1 (1993): 1-21. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25023942.
Gilmour-Bryson, Anne. “Sodomy and the Knights Templar.” Journal of the History of Sexuality 7, no. 2 (1996): 151-83. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3704138
By:Ernest Mwesigye
Middle Riddles 